LIBRARY 
UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
RIVERSIDE  ^ 


The  Rise  of 
Classical  English  Criticism 


^ 


A  History  of  the  Canons   of   English  Literary  Taste 

and  Rhetorical  Doctrine,  from  the  Beginning  of 

English  Criticism  to  the  Death  of  Dryden 


^ 


BY 

JAMES    ROUTH,  Ph.  D., 

Assistant  Professor  of  En*;lish  in  Tulane  Uni\-ersity 


NEW     ORLEANS: 

TULANE     UNIVERSITY     PRESS 
19  15 


CONTENTS 


PAGB 

Preface - 5 

Chapter  I:  The  Rule  of  L,aw lo 

Chapter  II:  The  Purpose  of  I^iterary  Art 27 

Chapter'III:  Types  of  Literature . 47 

Chapter  IV:  Material  Suitable  for  L,iterature 54 

Chapter  V:  Style — 7a 

Chapter  Vi:  Verse  Technique 98 


INTRODUCTION 


111  in1v()(luc-iiig  \c,  II10  r(>:iii('r  l!ic  f<)llo\^  iiiir  duiplers:  uu  tlu; 
histoi-y  of  critici^ini.  I  wish  ;i1  Uic  oulsel  to  cxlriid  l!i;iiilcs  Ic  llic 
o<li1or>  of  tlie  Eh(jU<che  Sludun  -iiiii  Ilic  .lonniai  of  I\iigli>li  ami 
(ji  inuDiir  Philology  for  ixn'iiiissioii  to  reprint  two  cliaiiltns  that 
origiuaily  appeared  in  those  journals;  also  to  tlie  editor  of  Anglia 
lor  similar  i)eriiiission  in  regard  to  anotlier  (riiaptiT  wliieh  is  to 
appear  in  that  journal.  I  also  wish  to  acknowledge  my  indclit- 
eduess  to  Professor  James  Bright  and  10  Ihe  hil.'  I'lofes-or 
Aleee  Fortier.  who  read  the  work  in  inanuseript. 


PREFACE : 
THE  LIMITS  OF  THE  DISCUSSION 


At  the  outsot  of  any  discussion  on  literary  criticism,  it  is 
necessary  to  create  certain  definitions  of  the  word  criticism.  The 
definitions  in  use  are  inade(juate.  To  appreciate  this  fact,  one 
need  onl\'  read  through  the  incoherent  and  nebulous  masses  of 
material  wliich  constitute  the  three  volumes  of  Professor  Saints- 
bury 's  History  of  Criticism.^  In  those  volumes  the  reader  will 
find  philosophy,  history,  criticism  and  literature ;  but  he  will 
not  in  any  of  them  find  out  definitely  what  literary  criticism  is, 
or  even  what  the  author  conceives  it  to  be.  As  a  consequence 
lic  never  knows,  in  leading  the  books,  precise!}'  what,  to  use  a 
good  Americanism,  the  author  is  driving  at. 

Miss  Wylie's  little  volume,-  as  admirable  as  it  is  in  the  pre- 
cision of  its  bare  facts,  suffers  from  the  same  defect.  Even  the 
Oxford  series  of  critical  essays^  suffer  from  a  similar  haziness 
of  purpose.  The  first  two  volumes  open  with  an  introduction 
that  is  by  far  the  sanest  thing  jet  done  in  this  field;*  and  the 
essays  are  fairly  uniform  in  type,  though  the  collection  does 
include,  as  the  editor  himself  points  out,  such  diverse  writers  as 


1.   Blackwood,   and   Dodd,    Mead  &r  Co.,    1904.      3   vols. 
1.   Blackwood,  and  Dodd,  Moad  &  Co.,   1904.     3  vols. 

3.  Smith,   Gregory.      Elizabethan  Critical  Essays.      (2   vols.),    1904. 
Spingarn,    J.    E.      Critical    Essays    of    the    Seventeenth    Century.       (3    toIs), 
1908,    1909. 

Ker,  W.  P.     Essays  of  Dryden.     (2  vols.),   1900. 

4.  A  few  errors  may,  however,  be  noted  in  Mr.  Smith's  treatise.  On  page 
xxiii,  it  is  stated  that  one  point  in  the  Elizabethan  defense  of  poetry  was  an  appeal 
to  its  divine  origin.  Note  3  gives  as  authority  Kir  Philii)  Sidney ;  but  the  passage 
of  Sidney  to  which  reference  is  made  is  wholly  skeptical  as  to  the  divine  pretensions 
of  classical  poetry;  while  the  allusion  to  the  I'salnis  nowise  identifies  the  divinity  as 
derived  from  the  fact  that  they  are  written  in  verse.  Note  4:  Mr.  Smith  says  "He 
[the  poet]  is  possessed  of  the  Platonic  furor" — that  is,  in  the  Elizabethan  conception. 
But  Note  4,  which  is  adduced  to  support  tliis,  refers  to  a  passage  which  reads:  "And 
this  science  [poetry]  in  his  perfection  cannot  grow  but  by  some  divine  instinct  — 
the  Platonics  call  it  furor;  or  [note  the  qualification]  by  excellency  of  nature  and 
complexion,  or" — by  subtlety,  etc.  Note  (i :  "Homer's  poems  were  \Yritten  "from  a 
free  fury.'"  Chapman  is  the  authority.  But  Chapman  says:  "Homer's  poems 
were  written  from  a  free  fury,  an  absolute  and  full  soul,  Virgil's  out  of  a  courtlv, 
laborious  and  altcigether  imitative  spirit."  This  scarcely  proves  that  Chapman  adduced 
divine  origin    in  defence  of  poetry.   ■ 

—5— 


n  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

•('m'  p»Hl:'.£r<'2ieal  Ascham,  the  fire-eater  Nash,  who  can  only  by  a 
^rcat  stretcli  of  the  Avord  he  eaHed  critical  at  all,  and  the  rheto- 
rici.n'n  Piittenhani.  But  the  following;  volumes  of  the  Oxford 
series  tliat  deal  Avith  the  seventeenth  century  are  less  uniform, 
and  admit  almost  any  sort  of  prose  that  happens  to  talk  about  lit- 
erature, regardless  of  whether  it  does  or  does  not  embody  real 
evaluations  or  the  enunciation  of  principles.  The  w'ork  of 
ITamelius"'  is  more  uniform,  but  treats  the  critical  writings 
rather  as  literary  essays  than  as  the  embodiment  of  principles; 
so  that  the  work  is  a  literary  history  rather  than  an  analysis  of 
principles.  To  this  last  class  of  writings  belongs  also  another 
admirable  piece  of  work  by  Mr.  Wm.  E.  Bohn,^  which  treats  of 
Dryden's  criticism.  Having  centered  the  attention  upon  th'* 
clironological  development  of  Dryden's  own  views  during  his 
lifetime,  the  author  makes  his  work  what  we  may — distorting 
the  phrase,  historical  criticism — call  biographical  criticism.  Be- 
bertag's  article  on  Dryden''  is  also  prevailingly  literary  in  its 
treatment.  ]\Ir.  Spingarn's  History  of  Literary  Criticism  in  the 
Renaissance^  defines  criticism  much  as  it  is  defined  below.  Owing 
to  Mr.  Spingarn's  sketchy  treatment  of  this  field,  however, 
there  is  here  but  little  duplication  of  his  work.  Dr.  Klein's 
Literary  Criticism  from  the  Elizabethan  Dramatists^  is  more  de- 
tailed in  character,  but  narrow  in  scope,  confining  itself  as  it 
does  to  the  opinions  of  the  dramatists  themselves;  it  is  also 
clumsy  in  treatment,  but  has  the  merit  of  preserving  the  same 
rational  definition  of  his  subject  and  his  purpose. 

^Mr.  Louis  Sigmund  Friedland.  in  his  treatise  on  The  Dramatic 
Unities  in  England,^"  treats  criticism  as  a  series  of  theoretical 
points  rather  than  as  a  series  of  men  Avho  wrote  on  the  subject. 
Some  of  Mr.  P^riedland's  facts  are  reproduced  here  for  the  sake 
of  completeness.  But  his  discussion  covers  only  a  small  portion 
of  critical  theory.  And  in  the  way  of  a  definition  of  criticism 
as  a  whole,  it  does  not  lielp  us  mucli  in  our  present  difficulty. 


5.  Die  Crit.  in  d.  enij.  Lit.  den  xcii  it.  xviii  Jahrh.     Leipzig:  Th.  Grieben,   1897. 

0.  "The    Development    of    Dryden"s    Literary    Criticism."       Pub.    Mod.    Lang. 
Aig'ii'.,    XX ii.    56. 

7.  -Drydens   Tlicorie    dcs   Dramas.'      Eng.    Stud,    IV,    373. 

«.  >r:icmilliin     (Colunil.'ia    I'niv.    Prpss),    1899. 

U.  Stiircis    &    Walton.     19 Id. 

10.  Jour,   of  En-j  .and  Otriii.  J'hiloL,  X.   .56,   280.  453. 


The  Ijyyiits  of  the  Piscussion  7 

Anotlior  .similar  discussion  of  ;i  liiuilcd  phase  of  the  subject, 
Mhieh  apix'ai's  to  assume,  (liougli  a  little  vaj^uely,  the  same 
definition  of  criticism  is  Professor  Arthur  J.  Tieje's  T]ie  Critical 
Heritage  of  Fiction  in  1579.^^ 

Since  tlien  there  is  no  definition  of  tlie  subject  that  is  fixed 
by  usage,  I  venture  to  frame  one  similar  to  Mr.  Spingam's, 
Avhich — even  if  it  be  acceptable  to  no  one  but  the  author — will 
at  least  serve  to  set  definite  limits  to  the  work  in  hand.  Accord- 
ing to  this  definition,  the  science  of  criticism  is  the  same  as  the 
science  of  rhetoric  in  its  largest  sense ;  and  the  history  of  criticism 
is  the  historj'  of  rhetorical  principles  as  they  have  changed  from 
century  to  century,  and  grown  in  changing.  This  definition  ex- 
cludes from  our  present  treatment  all  essays  that  criticise  par- 
ticular books  merely  by  applying  to  them  accepted  criteria.  It 
includes,  however,  reviews  of  such  nature  if  they  serve  to  make 
critical — oi'  rhetorical — principles  clearer  to  us  by  showing  how 
such  principles  are  applied.  It  includes  all  essays  which  in  any 
part  enunciate  or  explain  principles. 

Besides  limiting  the  subject  in  this  manner,  I  have  ventured 
upon  further  simplification.  A  treatise  which  touched  upon  all 
the  minor  vagaries  of  taste  that  have  appeared  in  historj-  might 
have  historical  value;  but  for  any  other  purpose  it  would  be  not 
only  useless  but  pernicious.  The  canons  of  taste  which  are  to 
us  things  of  vital  import,  and  which  in  the  last  analysis  are 
historieally  significant,  are  those  which  have  either  proved  their 
fitness  by  surviving,  or  have  risen  in  their  own  times  to  such  im- 
l)ortanee  as  to  influence  the  greater  masterpieces  of  those  times. 
By  authority  of  this  limitation,  the  discussion  is  restricted  to 
the  greater  critics,  that  is  to  those  who  are  universally  recognized 
as  such  liy  Iheir  contemporaries  or  by  later  historians. 

Still  another  simplification  has  been  introduced.  All  criti- 
cism, even  the  best,  is  more  or  less  infected  with  platitude.  Ben 
Jonson,  for  example,  writes:^-  "First,  we  require  in  our  poet, 
or  maker,  a  goodness  of  natural  wit.  For  whereas  all  other  arts 
consist  of  doctrine  and  precepts,  the  poet  must  be  able  by  nature 
and  instinct  to  pour  out  tlie  treasure  of  his  mind."  Such  things 
not  only  may  be  omitted.     Tiiey  must  be  omitted  from  any  dis- 


11.  Ent/.  t:tud.,  XLVII,   3,   p.   415. 

12.  Timber,  or  Dincoverivs. 


6  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

•.i«-:ioD  wliich  aims  to  extract  the  livinj?  portion  of  criticism 
--'•111  tlie  dead  debris  with  which  all  books  are  more  or  less  en- 
(•unil>erpd.  Of  such  nature  is  the  l)ulk  of  the  contents  of  most 
text-books  on  rhetoric,  including  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth 
century  works  of  such  nature. 

A  restriction  has  also  been  put  upon  the  subject  in  the  mat- 
ter of  date.  English  criticism,  in  its  earlier  period,  shows  a  most 
interesting  development.  Prom  the  beginning,  to  the  end  of 
Dryden's  career  there  is  almost  unbroken  development  with  few 
pauses,  little  retrogression  and  no  backwaters.  After  Dryden, 
criticism  continued  a  career  which  was  alive  and  which  carried 
on  traditions  without  break.  But  it  ceased  to  grow.  The  awe  of 
the  great  critic's  fame  seemed  to  dry  up  all  springs  of  originality. 
His  doctrines  with  but  slight  changes  became  dogmas,  and  were 
handed  down  in  such  form  until  the  daring  spirits  among  the 
Romanticists  finally  threw  them  overboard  in  the  latter  years 
of  the  eighteenth  century. ^^  This  account  of  the  rise  of  classical 
criticism  begins  then  with  the  beginning  of  English  criticism, 
in  the  second  half  of  the  sixteenth  century,"  and  ends  with 
the  year  1700,  when  the  last  of  the  important  essays  of  Dryden 
appeared,  just  before  his  death. 

The  points  taken  up  are  treated  chronologically,  except  where 
note  is  specifically  made  to  the  contrary.  That  is,  one  canon  is 
traced  throughout  the  whole  period  before  being  dropped  for 
anotlier.  The  reader  will  in  consequence  be  continually  shift- 
ing backward  and  forward  over  a  centurj-  or  more ;  but  this  has 
proved  less  confusing  than  a  shifting  from  canon  to  canon  in 
the  effoi't  to  trace  all  at  once. 

The  discussion  will,  in  general,  ignore  sources.  To  trace 
canons  back  to  their  Greek.  French  or  earlier  English  originals 
is  not  the  purpose  of  this  treatise.  The  thing  that  concerns  us  here 
is  knowledge  of  what  canons  of  art  men  held  during  the  period 
we  riiv  to  consider,  and  knowledge  of  how  the  body  of  canons 
grew  by  the  addition  of  new  laws,  or  was  i)urified  by  the  discard- 
ing of  outworn  ones.     AVliether  these  canons  were  borrowed  by 


y.'..  To  appreciate  keenly  this  lifelessness.  one  has  oiil.v  fo  read  the  slig)it  re- 
fleriions  iif  Shnftpsljury.  one  of  the  era's  be«t  f\\\V<.  and  compare  their  tenuous 
vi)lul/;!ity   wilh   the   str<-n;:ih    and   sanity   of   Dryden   or   r^ir    I'liilip   Sidney. 

1-1.    Sainisbur;  .   Vol     11.   v.    14.">   .1  xt-q.      Also  lb  ,  p.   148.   Xnle   2. 


The  Limits  of  the  Discussion  9 

their  advocatas  or  were  original  is  extraneous  here,  however  im- 
portant in  itself.  The  mere  fact  that  Jonson  or  Dryden  held  or 
advocated  a  principle  marks  that  principle  as  a  part  of  theo- 
retical English  literary  law,  whether  or  no  it  came  originally 
from  the  French  or  the  ancients. 

Throughout,  the  spelling  of  the  quotations  is  modernized.  No 
textual  questions  are  involved,  and  the  older  spelling  distracts 
attention  from  the  substance.  In  the  footnotes,  Sm.  is  used 
for  references  to  essays  in  Mr.  Gregory  Smith's  collection;  Sp. 
refers  to  IVIr.  Spingarn  's  collection  of  seventeenth  century  essays, 
K.  to  Mr.  Ker's  edition  of  Dryden 's  criticism. 

James  Routh. 

New  Orleans,  May  1,  1915. 


CHAPTER  I:    THE  RULE  OF  LAW 


]\rr.  Spingarn  calls  the  mechanical  universe  of  Locke  and 
Hobbes  the  basis  of  seventeenth  century  criticism.  Philosophy, 
hov.ever,  as  James  told  us,  even  logic,  is  a  way  of  looking  at 
things.  And  it  is  hard  to  avoid  the  conclusion  that  Locke  and 
Hobbes  looked  at  things  the  way  they  did  because  the  age  was  one 
of  classicism,  and  that  the  classical  conception  did  not  originate 
with  the  philosophers.  The  conclusion  is  strengthened  by  the  fact 
that  seventeenth  century  criticism  can  be  traced  back  to  Eliza- 
bethan classical  criticism  on  the  one  hand — which  flourished  in 
a  time  when  there  were  no  conceptions  of  a  mechanical  universe — 
and  to  the  theories  of  the  French  on  the  other.  In  fact,  Dry  den 's 
criticism,  and  for  that  matter  the  whole  age  in  which  he  lived, 
is  historically  intelligible  only  upon  the  supposition  that  it  is 
a  cross  between  Ben  Jonson's  England  and  Corneille's  France. 
And  Ben  Jonson  preceded  Locke  and  Hobbes,  while  Corneille 
Avas  probably  imtouched  by  their  philosophy.  Moreover,  English 
classical  criticism  as  such  began  an  hundred  years  before  Locke 
and  Hobbes  wrote.  English  criticism  was,  in  fact,  classical  from 
the  beginning.  There  was  no  romantic  criticism  corresponding 
to  the  art  of  Shakespeare.  In  the  previous  periods,  when  it 
might  have  arisen,  English  criticism  was  unborn.  And  in 
Shakespeare's  day,  criticism,  which  so  often  precedes  the  corre- 
sponding art,'  was,  under  renaissance  influences,  turning  to  the 
classical  ideas  which  were  to  characterize  the  poetry  and  drama 
of  a  following  period.  Hobbes  in  the  day  of  Cromwell  and  Locke 
in  that  of  Charles  were  then  natural  outgrowths  of  the  time. 

The  dominant  doctrine  of  this  classical  criticism  was  ad- 
herence to  the  literary  laws  of  the  ancients,  especially  of  Aris- 
totle and  Horace.^.    Another  source  of  the  classical  spirit  almost 


1.  Concerning  this  theory  that  in  literature  theory  precedes  practice,  see 
Bobertag,  I.  c.  375. 

2.  This  fact  is  so  fundamental,  and  so  universally  recognized  by  modern 
writers,  that  it  seems  superfluous  to  add  more  on  the  point.  Should  any  question 
arise    concerning    the    statement,    it    will    be    found    fully    answered    in    the    following 


pages. 

— 1< 


The  Rule  of  La^v  II 

as  important  as  the  study  of  the  ancients  was  the  growth  of 
polite  conversation.  The  age  from  Shakespeare  to  Dryden  was 
an  age  of  talk.''  And  talk,  centered  in  the  court  and  made 
into  a  fine  art,  earae  at  last  in  the  later  seventeenth  century  to 
have  the  regulated,  law-abiding  propriety  of  all  conventional 
manners.  With  the  somewhat  priggish  and  frequently  unintel- 
ligent Aristotle- worship  on  the  one  hand,  and  with  tlie  craving  on 
the  other  for  conversation  that  should  be  at  once  proper  and  ele- 
gant, there  was  a  third  element  tliat  made  for  formality.  This 
was  the  court  temper.  Educated  men  despised  the  herd.  They 
interlarded  their  discourse  with  fragments  of  Latin,  in  order 
to  show  their  rank.  Simultaneously  playwrights  began  to  show 
a  preference  for  the  elegant  heroic  line.*  In  criticism  Webbe 
is  doubtful  of  the  common  people's  judgment  of  poets ;°  and 
Davenant  sixty  years  after  comes  to  the  stronger  conclusion  that 
he  is  hopeless  of  the  common  crowd"  and  deserts  it,  to  take  from 
court  and  camp  the  patterns  to  be  dressed  up  for  noble  readers.^ 

These  three  elements  in  classicism,^  when  combined  into  a 
school,  took  two  concrete  forms,  the  rule  of  taste — i.  e.  sophisti- 
cated and  trained  taste — and  the  rule  of  reason.  But  as  taste, 
when  interpreted,  always  meant  taste  as  reason  considered  it 
ought  to  be,  the  whole  thing  resolved  itself  into  a  rule  of  reason; 
and  the  reason  which  ruled  was  educated,  directly  or  indirectly, 
out  of  the  texts  of  the  ancients.''  This  then  was,  in  general 
terms,  tiie  meaning  of  the  classical  rule  of  law. 

The  keynote,  the  shibboleth,  of  this  criticism  was  "decorum." 


3.  Sp.  xlvi.  Dryden  explained  the  "defects"  in  the  lungiia{:e  of  the  Elizabethans 
as  due  to  tlieir  lack  of  refinement  in  the  language  of  conversation.  {Drfenxf  of  the 
EpUoff.  1672.  K.  1,  175.  See  also  Bohn,  /.  c.  94.)  Cf.  also  the  epilog  to  the 
second  part  of  the  Conquest  of  Grenada   (1672). 

Thus  Jonson  did  mechanic  humor  show, 

AVTien    men     were    dull,     and    conversation    low. 

4.  Cf.  Manage  a  la  Mode,  in  which  the  English  prose  comedy  and  the  classical 
heroics  are   absurdly   and   incongruously   mingled. 

5.  Of  Enylish  Poetry    (1586).     Sm.  I,   298.     Cf.  also  Dr.  Klein,    IT  <f  seq. 

6.  Preface  to  Gondibert   (1650).     Sp.  II,  14. 

7.  An  interesting  corollary  can  be  drawn  from  Pope's  observation  on  Shake- 
speare (Preface  to  his  ed.  of  Shakespeare)  to  the  cfTect  that  much  of  his  strength 
came  from  the  fact  that  he  adapted  himself — as  we  might   say — to  the  galleries. 

8.  Cf.  on  this  point  Schelling's  definition  (/.  e.  221)  of  the  difference  between 
classicism   and   romanticism. 

9.  Cf.  Miss  Wylie  (I.  c.  14)  on  Jonson's  deference  to  the  past  and  advocacy 
of  the  discipline  of  reason.  Cf.  also  Corneille's  version  of  .Aristotle's  dictum 
(Discours  de  I'L'lUite  et  des  Parties  dii  Poeme  Drauiatiqiir.  1C60)  that  the  sole 
end  of  poetry  is  to  please,  but  that   in  order  to  please  one  must  follow  rules. 


!2  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticistn 

Tliis  appears,  according  to  IMr.  Smith,  first  in  Ascham.^"  E.  K.^^ 
praises  Spenser's  decorum.  Webbe^-  makes  the  matter  more 
specific  when  he  writes: 

"The  propriety  of  speech  must  be  duly  observed  that  weighty 
and  great  matters  be  not  spoken  slenderly  or  matters  of  length 
too  briefly :  for  it  belongeth  much  both  to  the  comeliness  and 
nature  of  a  matter  that  in  big  matters  there  be  likewise  used 
boisterous  words." 

And  again :  In  a  satire  great  heed  must  be  taken  of  decorum 
"that  he  which  represented  some  noble  personage  in  the  tragedy 
be  not  some  busy  fool  in  the  satire."  Puttenham,^^  as  usual,  is 
more  sound  and  clear  upon  the  point: 

"But  generall^^  to  have  the  style  decent  and  comely,  it  be- 
hooves the  maker  or  poet  to  follow  the  nature  of  his  subject; 
that  is,  if  his  matter  be  high  and  lofty  that  the  style  be  so  too, 
if  mean  [oS  middle  rank],  he  style  also  to  be  mean,  if  base,  the 
style  humble  and  base  acordingly."  This,  evidently  our  mod- 
em rhetorician's  tone  Puttenham  calls  decorum  of  style.  He 
further'*  defines  decorum  as  decency,  seemliness,  comeliness, 
pleasant  approach  and  convenient  proportion.  But  these  terms 
add  nothing  in  the  way  of  definition,  unless  it  be  the  last  term, 
proportion,  in  which  we  recognize  another  of  our  modern  rhe- 
torical principles.*^  Ben  Jonson,*"  a  little  later,  has  the  same 
thing  in  mind  when  he  speaks  of  what  he  considers  the  undecor- 
ous  customs  of  his  contemporaries,  the  romanticists.  It  is  folly, 
he  conceives, 

10.  (1570).   Sm.   XXXV,   xxxviii. 

11.  (1579).   Sm.  I,   128. 

12.  I.  c.  Sm.  I,  290.  Cf.  Webbe's  list  of  canons  of  art,  and  (in  Mr.  Smith's 
notes,   I,   417)   the  original  canons  oi   Horace. 

13.  The  Art  of  EnyliKh  Poeny    (1589).      Sm.   II,    155. 

14.  76.    174. 

15.  Mr.  Smith,  in  this  connection,  quotes  Harinsffon  to  the  effect  that  there 
may  be  decorum  in  persons  who  speak  lasciviously  (xlii).  This  is  correct,  but  mis- 
leading; for  Harrington  (Sm.  II,  215),  in  the  same  breath  praises  Ariosto  for  his 
freedom  from  ribaldry  and  obscenity,  then  says  "Further  there  is  so  meet  a  decorum 
in  the  persons  of  those  that  speak  lasciviously,  as  any  of  judgment  must  needs 
allow.  And  therefore,  though  I  rather  crave  pardon  than  praise  for  him  in  this 
point,  yet  methinks  I  can  smile  at  the  fineness  of  some  that  will  condemn  him,  and 
yet  not  only  allow  but  admire  our  Chaucer,  who  both  in  words  and  sense  incurs 
far  more  the  reprehension  of  flat  scurrility,  as  I  could  recite  many  places,  not  only 
in  the  Miller's  Tale,  but  in  the  good  Wife  of  Bath's  Tale  ,and  many  more,  in  which 
only  the  decorum   he  keeps  i.s  that  that  excises  it  and  makes  it  more  tolerable." 

16.  Eiery  Man  in  JUn  Humor  (1596?).  Sm.  II,  389.  Cf.  also  Conversations 
with    Drummond.      Sp.    I,    212,    215. 


The  Rule  of  Law  13 

"To  make  a  child,  now  swaddled,  to  proceed 
M:an,  and  then  shoot  up  in  one  beard  and  weed, 
Past  threescore  years;  or,  with  three  rusty  swords. 
And  help  of  some  few  foot-and-half-foot  words, 
Fight  over  York  and  Lancaster's  long  jars, 
And  in  the  tiring-house  bring  wounds  to  scars." 
The  playwright,  instead  of  doing  this,  is  to  write  "deeds  and 
language,  such  as  men  do  use."     Elsewhere  he  advises  writers 
to  follow  the  classics.^^ 

This  is  about  all  we  can  do  from  the  evidence  towards  defin- 
ing decorum  as  the  Elizabethan  and  his  immediate  successors 
saw  it.  At  about  this  time  there  is  a  gap  in  English  criticism, 
the  breaking  of  tlie  silence  being  preceded  immediately  by  the 
introduction  of  French  ideas  and  followed  by  criticism  striking- 
ly like  the  French  in  tone  and  doctrine.  It  was  in  1635  that  the 
French  academy  was  established  and  proceeded  to  adopt  the 
classical  criticism.  In  the  same  j^ear  this  criticism  was  adopted 
by  the  court.  The  standard  of  French  criticism  though  soon 
came  to  be — so  far  as  Englisli  admirers  of  French  theory'  werj 
concerned — the  doctrines  of  Corneille,  which  grew  out  of  the 
discussions  of  tlie  Academy  concerning  the  Cid,  in  16:^8.  and 
were  embodied  in  the  dramatist's  essays  on  dramatic  technique." 
He  believed  in  a  "favorable  interpretation"^®  of  the  classical 
rules,  which  was  doubtless  considered  very  liberal.^^  But  his 
oMTi  modified  I'ules  soon  hardened  into  dogmas  as  rigid  as  those 
of  the  ancients.  This  conception  of  a  reign  of  law  passed  into 
England,  and  made  the  already  predominant  classicism  yet  more 
rigidly  formal.  At  the  same  time  we  begin  to  hear  less  of 
decorum  and  rather  more  of  the  particular  rules  which  summed 
up  constitute  the  rather  vague  conception,  decorum.  The  rules 
are  treated  more  in  detail  in  the  chapters  to  follow,  but  we  may 
proceed  with  a  few  notes  as  to  the  prevalence  of  the  general  con- 
ception in  this  period  of  a  reign  of  very  decorous  law. 


17.  Timber    (1620-35?).      Saintsbury   II,   203. 

18.  Cf.  ossays  of  Comeille  in  collected  works.  Also  Miss  Wylie.  18,  and 
Brunetiere,  L'Evolnlion  dcs  Genres  dans  L'JJistoire  dt  la  Li'tiruture.  Paris, 
1892.      I,    76. 

19.  Diieourf  de  la  Tragfdie   (1660). 

20.  Tile  contemporary  conception  of  St.  Evremond  concerning  law  was  freer 
still.     Miss  V/ylie,   :i2-2A. 


14  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

J-'li'L-kiuH'-'  gives  a  definition  of  decorum  when  he  says: 

"Heanniont  and  Fletcher  were  excellent  of  their  kind,  but 
lliey  •.)rien  erred  against  <!ecorum,  seldom  representing  a  valiant 
man  without  somewhat  of  the  braggadocio,  nor  an  honorable 
woman  without  somewhat  of  Dol  Common  in  her;  to  say  nothing 
of  their  irreverent  representing  kings'  persons  on  the  stage,  who 
should  never  be  represented  but  with  reverence."  The  first 
part  of  this,  in  its  complete  blindness  to  the  incongruities  of 
real  life,  is  characteristic  of  Corneille.  The  last  line  echoes 
one  of  the  characteristic  notes  of  French  classicism,  the  ideal 
of  a  noble  king  to  whom  common  thoughts  are  unknown.  In 
the  hands  of  Phillips^-  and  Rymer,"^  decorum  becomes  at  once 
clearer  and  more  concrete.  Phillips  objects  to  the  describing 
ancient  things  after  a  modern  model,  a  doctrine  trite  enough  to 
us,  but  important  as  the  first  charge — under  the  guise  of  classical 
decorum — of  the  now  aggressive  historical  realism.  Rymer,  in 
the  passage  in  question,  is  treating  Shakespeare.  In  Othello, 
the  characters  are  such  that  "By  their  conduct  and  manner  of 
talk,  a  body  must  strain  hard  to  fancy  the  scene  at  Venice ;  and 
not  rather  in  some  of  our  Cinq-ports,  where  the  bailey  and  his 
fisher-men  are  knocking  their  heads  together  on  account  of  some 
whale,  or  some  terrible  broil  upon  the  coast." 

Here  we  have  the  first  notes  of  another  modern  characteristic 
as  important  as  historical  realism :  that  is  local  color. 

Finally  in  this  matter,  we  come  to  the  doctrines  of  Dryden. 
Some  are  earlier  in  date  than  the  last  quoted,  but  his  doctrines 
as  a  whole  naturally  stick  together  as  the  supreme  manifestation 
of  English  classicism.  Dryden 's  great  masterpiece,  the  Essay 
of  Dramatic  Poesy  was  suggested  by  Flecknoe's  Discourse  of  the 


21.  A   Short  Discourse  of  the  English  Stage   (1C64).      Sp.   II,   94. 

22.  Preface  to   Thealrum  Poetarum    (167o).      Sp.    II,    269. 

23.  A  Short  View  of  Tragedy,  itH  Original,  Excellency,  and  Corruption,  with 
Some  Reflections  07i  Shakespeare  and  other  Practitioners  for  the  Stage.  (1693). 
Sp.  II,  228.  Cf.  Dennis,  The  Impartial  Critic  (1693).  Sp.  Ill,  148  el  seq.  Cf. 
also  George  B.  Dutton,  "The  French  Aristotelian  Formalists  and  Thomas  Rymer," 
Puh.  Mod.  Lang.  Anson.,  .x.xii,   152. 


The  Rtde  of  Law  15 

English  Stage;^^  but  it,  like  his  other  criticism,  was  largely 
French  in  the  original  sources  and  impulses.  His  rules  for  the 
stage  are  close  to  those  of  the  French.^* 

The  definite  expressions  of  Dryden's  adherence  to  classicism 
may  be  indicated  briefly  in  chronological  order.  One  of  the 
earliest  expressions  of  it,  and  about  the  most  rational,  occurs  in 
the  Epistle  Dedicatory  of  the  Rival  Ladies  :^® 

"Here  [in  poetry]  is  no  chance,  which  you  have  not  foreseen; 
all  your  heroes  are  more  than  your  subjects,  they  are  your  crea- 
tures; and  though  they  seem  to  move  freely  in  all  the  sallies  of 
their  passions,  yet  you  make  destinies  for  them,  which  they  can- 
not shun.  They  are  moved  (if  I  may  dare  to  say  so)  like  the 
rational  creatures  of  the  Almighty  Poet,  who  walk  at  liberty,  in 
their  own  opinion,  because  their  fetters  are  invisible." 

In  the  Defense  of  the  Epilogue,  the  word  decorum^"  appears 
as  such,  where  a  speaker  in  the  dialog  accuses  Fletcher  of  lacking 
it.  "For  his  Shepherd,"  among  other  characters,  "he  falls 
twice  into  the  former  indecency  of  wounding  women." 

In  A  Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting,  his  classicism  sinks 
into  servility.  As  we  may  not  encounter  again  such  a  phenom- 
enon, it  may  be  interesting  to  read  specimens: 

^^"All  who,  having  rejected  the  ancient  rules,  and  taken  the 
opposite  ways,  yet  boast  themselves  to  be  masters  of  this  art,  do 
but  deceive  others,  and  are  themselves  deceived,  for  that  is  abso- 
lutely impossible." 


24.  See  Sp.  II,  91. 

Dryden  himself  acknowledges  his  debt  to  Ben  Jonson,  "Father  Ben"  [Essay  of 
Draw.  P.,  K.  I,  41  and  43,  and  the  Defense  of  the  Essay,  K.  I,  122  and  125.  His 
plays  also  show  this  influence  strongly,  especially  tlip  comic  parts  of  his  first  play. 
The  Wild  Gallant.l,  to  Casaubon  [Discourse  Concerning  the  Original  and  Progress 
of  Satire],  to  Aristotle,  Horace  and  Corneille  [See  especially  the  Defense  of  an 
Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy,  K.  I,  122  and  125],  and  to  Longinus  [Preface  to  Troiius 
and  Cressida.     See  also  Bobertag,  I.  c,  396]. 

Dryden's  statements  in  the  Essay  of  Dramatic  Potsy  must  be  taken  with 
caution,  as  there  are  four  controversial  speakers,  to-wit :  Eugenius  [Charles  Sack- 
ville],  Lisideius  [Sir  Charles  Sedley],  Crites  [Sir  Robert  Howard],  and  Neander 
[Dryden].  Cf.  the  opinion  of  Bobertag  [I.  c,  386]  that  Neander  cannot  always 
be  considered  as  speaking  for  Dryden. 

25.  Wylie,   3. 

26.  (1664).  K.  I,  4.  This  parugrnph  is  suscejitible  of  an  unclassical  inter- 
pretation,  but   the  clasical  falls  in  better  with  the  usual  tone  of  Dryden. 

27.  Defense  of  the  Epilogue    (1672).   K.   I,    166. 

28.  (1695).  K.  II,  134.  Cf.,  however,  preceding  sentences  for  a  partial  ex- 
planation. 


1 6  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

-""To  inform  onr  jiKlgments,  and  to  reform  our  tastes,  rules 
were  invented,  that  by  them  we  might  discern  when  nature  was 
imitated,  and  how  nearly." 

Again,  but  more  rationally  :^° 

"Without  rules  there  can  be  no  art,  any  more  than  there 
can  be  a  house  without  a  door  to  conduct  you  into  it. ' ' 

But  again,  with  even  more  than  usual  servility  :^^ 

"Homer  and  Virgil  are  to  be  our  guides  in  the  epic;  Sopho- 
cles and  Euripides  in  tragedy :  in  all  things  we  are  to  imitate  the 
customs  and  the  times  of  those  j)ersons  and  things  which  we  rep- 
resent: not  to  make  new  rules  of  the  drama,  as  Lopez  de  Vega 
has  attempted  unsuccessfully  to  do,  but  to  be  content  to  follow 
our  masters,  who  understood  nature  better  than  we." 

A  little  concession  though  he  makes: 

"But  if  the  story  which  we  treat  be  modem,  we  are  to  vary 
the  customs,  according  to  the  time  and  the  country  where  the 
scene  of  action  lies;  for  this  is  still  to  imitate  nature,  which  is 
ahvaj's  the  same,  though  in  a  different  dress." 

On  the  other  hand  we  have,  almost  in  the  preceding  sentence 
the  best  spirit  of  the  classicists,  "to  put  all  things  in  a  beautiful 
order  and  harmony,  that  the  whole  may  be  of  a  piece." 

Tliis  brings  us  to  the  end  of  our  period.  A  further  point 
should  be  noticed,  however.  The  chissical  criticism,  at  the  very 
moment  of  its  fullest  development  was  breeding  germs  of  decay. 
The  servility  of  Dryden  has  been  noted.  The  ethical  defection 
was  not  its  only  defect.  For  it  lead  to  a  train  of  inconsis- 
tencies, which  vitiated  the  whole  mass  of  classical  criticism,  and 
whicli,  1  believe,  was,  more  than  anything  else,  the  immediate 
cause  of  its  decay. 

It  is  assumed  by  most  that  the  decay  of  classicism  was  due  to 
the  paf-;sing  of  the  "classical  spirit."  As  we  have  noticed,  the 
criticism  of  an  age  has — if  we  may  judge  from  the  scanty  data 
we  have — usually  preceded  the  development  of  the  corresponding 
art  form.  But  classical  criticism  was  decaying  when  classical  art 
was  attaining  its  highest,  in  the  eighteenth  century.  A  mere  pass- 
ing of  the  classical  spirit  could  not  at  one  and  the  same  point  of 


29.  lb.  137. 

30.  lb.    138. 

31.  76.    139. 


The  Rule  of  Law  17 

history  account  for  the  rise  of  one  form  of  classical  writing  and 
the  decay  of  another.  Again,  had  classical  criticism  been  merely 
narrow,  but  correct,  the  correct  norm  would  have  remained ;  in- 
corporated perhaps  in  an  overgrowing  romanticism,  but  substan- 
tially unchanged.  But  a  self -contradictory  system,  even  if  men 
failed  to  detect  the  fallacies,  could  not  live,  because  it  could 
only  now  and  then,  and  by  accident,  work  out  a  play  or  poem 
which  could  be  permanently  successful. 

But  to  take  up  some  of  these  fallacies  specifically.  The  famous 
Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy  contains  some  put  into  the  mouth  of 
Neander,  who  speaks  for  Dryden.    For  example : 

•■'-It  might  be  supposed,  says  Neander,  that  blank  verse  is 
better  for  the  stage  than  rhyme,  since  nearer  the  speech  of  real 
life.  But  rhyme  may  be  made  as  natural  as  blank  verse  by 
proper  rearrangement  of  its  structure.  Rhyme  then  is  equally 
natural  and  at  the  same  time  sweeter  by  reason  of  the  rhyme. 
The  remainder  of  the  passage  is  so  contradictory  as  to  be  scarcely 
intelligible.  [See  footnote].  But  heroic  verse  finds  an  even 
more  remarkable  defense  :^^ 

"Tragedy,  we  know,  is  wont  to  image  to  us  the  minds  and 
fortunes  of  noble  persons,  and  to  portray  these  exactly;  heroic 
rhyme  is  nearest  nature,  as  being  the  noblest  kind  of  modem 
verse."    And  again,  a  little  farther  on: 

"Blank  verse  is  acknowledged  to  be  too  low  for  a  poem, 
nay  more,  for  a  paper  of  verses;  but  if  too  low  for  an  ordinary 
sonnet,  how  much  more  for  tragedy,  which  is  by  Aristotle,  in  the 


32.  "If  then  verse  may  be  made  natural  in  itself,  how  becomes  it  improper 
to  a  pla.v ?  Vou  say  the  stage  is  the  representation  of  nature,  and  no  man  in 
ordinary  conversation  speaks  in  rhyme.  But  you  foresaw  when  you  said  this,  that 
it  might  be  answered — neither  does  any  man  speak  in  blank  verse,  or  in  measure 
without  rhyme.  Therefore  you  concluded,  that  which  is  nearest  nature  is  still  to 
he  preferred.  But  you  took  no  notice  that  rhyme  might  be  made  as  natural  as 
blank  verse,  by  the  well  placing  of  the  words,  etc.  All  the  difference  betwein  them, 
when  they  are  both  correct,  is,  the  sound  in  one,  which  the  other  wants;  and  if  so, 
the  sweetness  of  it,  and  all  the  advantage  resulting  from  it,  which  are  handled  in  the 
Preface  to  Thr  Riral  Ladies,  will  yet  stand  good.  As  for  that  place  in  Aristotle, 
where  he  says,  plays  should  be  written  in  that  kind  of  verse  which  is  nearest  prose, 
it  makes  little  for  you;  blank  verse  being  properly  but  measure<l  prose.  Now  measure 
alone,  in  any  modern  language,  does  not  constitute  verse."  Hence  blank  verse,  he 
concludes,  is  practically  prose,  and  suitable  only  for  comedy.  But  the  remainder  of 
this  remarkable  jumble  of  ideas  the  reader  should  puzzle  out  for  himself,  in  its 
extraordinary  entirety.      K.   I,   96. 

33.  lb.   101. 


18  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

tiisi)ute  betwixt  the  epic  poesy  aud  tlie  dramatic,  for  many  rea- 
sons he  there  alleges,  ranked  above  it?" 

Or  once  more,  what  are  we  to  think  of  such  false  analogy 
as  this  •?*  For  a  man  on  the  stage  to  speak  a  half  line  or  a  whole 
which  rlnanes  with  the  preceding,  may  be  considered  bad,  since 
it  suggests  design  and  not  spontaneity.    But : 

"Supposing  we  acknowledge  it:  how  comes  this  confederacy 
to  be  more  displeasing  to  you,  than  in  a  dance  which  is  well  con- 
trived?"   Then  after  a  little  the  subject  is  concluded: 

"But  there  is  also  the  quick  and  poignant  brevity  of  it  (which 
is  an  high  imitation  of  nature  in  those  sudden  gusts  of  passion) 
to  mingle  with  it;  and  this,  joined  with  the  cadency  and  sweet- 
ness of  the  rhyme,  leaves  nothing  in  the  soul  of  the  hearer  to 
desire."  The  jumble  of  subtle  truth  with  absurdity  in  this 
closing  sentence  will  present  itself. 

It  is  possible  that  Dry  den's  contemporaries  did  not  see  these 
things.  But  the  following  self-contradiction  is  so  flagrant  as 
not  merely  to  explain  the  weakness  of  the  doctrine,  but  also  to 
cause  us  to  marvel  over  the  blindness  of  his  readers.  One  of  the 
passages  in  question  has  just  been  quoted,  but  it  wall  be  worth 
while  to  repeat  it,  in  order  to  confront  it  more  directly  with 
the  other.'*'    The  passages  are  these : 

"All  who,  having  rejected  the  ancient  rules,  and  taken  the  op- 
posite ways,  yet  boast  themselvas  to  be  masters  of  this  art,  do 
but  deceive  others,  and  are  themselves  deceived;  for  that  is 
absolutely  impossible. ' ' 

"Invention  is  the  first  part  [of  painting  and  poetry],  and 
absolutely  necessary  to  them  both ;  yet  no  rule  ever  was  or  ever 
can  be  given,  how  to  compass  it.  A  happy  genius  is  the  gift  of 
nature." 

Frequently  Dryden's  fallacies  are  due  to  lack  of  information 
as  to  the  facts  of  the  case.  His  conclusion,  for  example,  that 
blank  verse  is  farther  removed  from  ordinary  converse  than 
prose'*"  may  well  be  questioned.  Our  language,  when  spoken 
by  a  person  instinctively  musical  in  temperament,  and  especially 


34.  Ih.    103. 

35.  Quoted  on  page  15.     Both  are  from  the  Parallel  of  Poeiry  and  Painting,  K. 
II,  pp.   134,    138  respectively. 

36.  C7.  also  K.  I,   114. 


The  Ride  of  Law  19 

wlifjn  colored  by  emotion,  falls  naturally  into  somctliing  re- 
sembling feet.  And  a  slight  regularization  of  these  feet  is  all 
that  is  needed  to  make  blank  verse.^^  For  few  metrists  will  deny 
that  in  most  blank  verse  the  line-ending  is  almost  as  arbitrary  as 
the  end  assigned  by  a  printer  to  a  line  of  prose.  We  read  blank 
verse  as  a  continuous  flow  of  feet,  preserving  perhaps  a  slight 
suggestion  of  the  lines  in  the  intonation,  at  the  same  time  avoid- 
ing any  further  such  suggestion  by  a  free  use  of  run-on  lines. 

In  the  same  essay ^*  Drj'den  returns  to  the  subject  of  the 
twenty-four  hour  period  for  unity  of  time : 

"Where  is  the  absurdity  of  affirming,  that  the  feigned  busi- 
ness of  twenty-four  imagined  hours,  may  not  more  naturally  be 
represented  in  the  compass  of  three  real  hours,  than  the  like 
feigned  business  of  twenty-four  years  in  the  same  proportion 
of  real  time?" 

Let  us  look  at  the  subject  a  moment.  For  a  drama,  any 
period  exceeding  the  actual  three  hours  must  proceed  by  episodes. 
The  individual  scene  can  only  represent  the  length  of  time  it 
takes  to  perform  it ;  but  between  scenes,  some  events  are  omitted, 
which  is  to  say  some  time  is  omitted.  Regarding  the  matter 
tluis,  it  is  very  difficult  for  us  to  get  from  Dryden,  or  the  other 
classicists,  any  intelligible  reason  whj'  these  omitted  gaps  may 
not  cover  ten  years  as  well  as  ten  hours,  aiid  that  with  no  lo&s 
of  verisimilitude.  In  fact,  we  see  plots  in  real  life  working 
out  by  episodes  with  long  negative  gaps  between,  and  these 
gaps  are  more  frequently  gaps  of  months  or  years  than  of  hours. 
These  conclusions  are  so  clearly  imtenable,  they  could  never  have 
survived  in  api)lied  art,  that  is,  in  plays.  Even  in  The  liivals, 
which  may  be  brought  up,  together  with  the  other  Sheridan  and 
Goldsmith  plays,  as  a  survi\4ng  monument  of  classicism,  no  one 
dreams  of  taking  the  assigned  five  hours  as  the  real  duration 


37.  Apropos  of  this:  I  have  heard  illiterate  negro  pickaninnies,  of  eight  or 
ten  years,  singing  improvised  conversation  to  one  another  across  the  street  in  a 
style  wliich,  except  in  the  quality  Of  the  music,  differed  in  no  particular  from  that 
of  grand  opera.  Here  then  was  neither  design  nor  anything  except  the  most  primi- 
tive and  instinctive  artifice.  Doubtless  many  mannerisms  in  our  dramas  that  appear 
forced  to  us  were  natural  enough  to  the  Italians  or  other  persons  of  southern  race 
who  invented  them,  as  was  suggested  by  John  Dennis  {The  Impartial  Critic,  1693. 
Sp.    TIT.    148). 

:i8.   lb.   129. 


20  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

<»f  the  eA'ents.  To  jret  tliroiijih  the  action  in  that  time — or  in 
twenty- four  hours — in  real  life,  the  figures  would  have  to  move 
with  the  celerity  of  a  cinematograph;  besides  eliminating  all  time 
for  retieetion  on  the  part  of  the  characters  over  the  moves  they 
make.  The  mind  instinctively  ignores  the  absurdity.  The 
elassical  canon,  being  illogical,  refused  to  work  in  the  mind  and 
instincts  of  the  observer,  and  so  failed. 

Elsewhere  Dryden  says,  concerning  a  large  proportion  of 
the  characters  of  Fletcher's  plays,  ^^"  You  know  not  whether  they 
resemble  vice  or  virtue,  and  they  are  either  good,  bad,  or  in- 
different, as  the  present  scene  requires  it;"  as  if  men  did  not 
change  from  moods  of  vice  to  those  of  virtue  on  the  most  irre- 
sponsible and  unforeseeable  impulses.  His  misjudgment  of 
Chaucer  through  ignorance  of  his  pronunciation  is  famous. 
When  contradicted  on  this  point  by  a  contemporary,  who  said 
the  fault  was  in  the  critic's  ear  and  not  in  Chaucer,  he  replied 
dogmatically : 

*""This  opinion  is  not  worth  confuting;  'tis  so  gross  and  ob- 
vious an  error,  that  common  sense  (which  is  a  rule  in  everything 
but  matters  of  faith  and  revelation)  must  convince  the  reader, 
that  equality  in  numbers,  in  every  verse  which  we  call  heroic,  was 
either  not  known,  or  not  always  practiced,  in  Chaucer's  age." 

He  is  also  capable  of  misquoting  his  authority.  His  misinter- 
pretation of  Aristotle's  idea  of  katharsis  is  a  serious  blunder.*^ 
Tragedy  is  to  purge  the  passions  by  example ;  which  is  in  all  like- 
lihood not  Aristotle's  idea  at  all.  In  Corneille*^  there  is  such 
a  view  expressed ;  but  this  seems  to  be  curiously  mixed  here  with 
the  other  Aristotelian  idea  of  purgation  through  self-expression. 

These  inconsistencies  go  far  toward  explaining  the  decay  of 
classical  criticism.  But  there  was  another  force  that  hastened 
the  disintegration.  This  was  the  force  of  a  growing  spirit  of 
skepticism  as  to  law ;  that  is,  of  romanticism,  for  in  the  criticism 
of  this  period  romanticism  was  comprised  in  the  one  note  of 
skepticism.  For  nineteenth  century  romantic  criticism,  we  are 
indebted,  in  part  at  least,  to  Germany.    But  this  early  romantic 


39.  Preface  to  TroUvs  and  Crexsida   (1679).  K.  I,  217. 

40.  Preface  to  the  Fables   (1700).  K.  II,  259. 

41.  Preface  to  Troihu  and  Crt-nxida   (1079).   K.  I,  209.     Cf.  Ch.  II. 

42.  iJixrovrK   dru    Troix    I'niteH    (16G0).      See   p.    29. 


The  RtiU  of  Law  21 

dissent — fur  revolt  is  too  strong  a  word — seems  to  have  been  a 
spontaneous,  instinctive  affair.  It  was  feeble  in  volume,  and  the 
ideas  frequently  departed  from  classicism  so  little  as  to  be  in- 
distinguisiiable  unless  one  traces  in  succeeding  centuries  the 
full  romantic  theories  that  grew  from  them  as  germs. 

Almost  the  earliest  of  these  romantic  notes  came  from  Ben 
Jonson*-'  in  his  Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor,  Cordatus  speak- 
ing: 

"No,  I  assure  you,  signior;  if  tliose  laws  you  speak  of  had 
been  delivered  us  ab  initio,  and  in  their  present  virtue  and  per- 
fection, there  bad  been  some  reason  of  obeying  their  powers." 
But  the  forms  of  the  drama  have  always  been  changing.  "I 
see  not  then  but  we  should  enjoy  the  same  licentia  or  free  power 
to  illustrate  and  heighten  our  invention  as  they  did;  and  not 
be  tied  to  those  strict  and  regular  forms  which  the  niceness  of  a 
few  (who  are  nothing  but  form)  would  thrust  upon  us." 

He  also  observes  that  Drummond"  objected  that  his  [Jon- 
son's]  verses  "smelled  too  much  of  the  Schools." 

At  about  the  same  period*''  we  have  a  bit  of  very  elementary 
romanticism  from  Samuel  Daniel,  who,  in  Solomonesque  strain, 
concludes,  not  indeed  that  all  is  vanity,  but  that  all  passes,  and 
that  our  laws  are  but  things  of  a  day.  Tout  passe,  tout  cassc,  tout 
lasse,  as  a  much  later  romanticist  has  observed.  Davenant*"  also 
is  a  skeptic — as  to  the  value  of  that  primary  instrument  of  classi- 
cism, imitation.  He  is  also  a  seeker  ofter  novelty  and  hopes  to 
represent  nature  "in  an  luiusual  dress. "*^  Hobbes**  also  denies 
the  authority  of  taste;  and  later  Sir  Robert  Howard*"  does  the 
same  in  his  preface  to  The  Great  Favourite,  or  The  Duke  of 
Lerma,  an  essay  best  known  as  the  provocation  for  Dry  den's 
contradictions  in  his  Defense  of  an  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy, 


43.  (1600).      Sm.   11,   392. 

44.  (1619).     Sp.  I,  212.     Sainfslniry  II,  200. 

45.  Difens,-    of    Rhijme.       (1603  0-      Sm.    Lxiv ;    II,    384. 

46.  (le.'iO).    Sp.    II,    7. 

47.  Ih.  x.xxiv;  II,  23. 

48.  (1650).  Sp.  xcvii.  Mr.  Spingarn  refers  to  Hobbes,  Howard  and  others 
influenced  by  the  Frence  Precit'unf  spirit  as  representing  "the  first  stage  of  the  dis- 
cussion, in  which  all  authority  in  taste  is  denied."'  But.  as  we  have  just  seen, 
these  men  were  preceded  by  .Fonson  in  a  partial  denial  of  authority,  and  by  Daniel  in 
complete  skepticism   as  to  authority,   by   nearly   half   a   century. 

49.  (1668).     Sp.  lb.;  also  II,   109. 


22  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

which  bears  the  sub-title,  Being  an  Answer  to  the  Preface  of 
'  The  Great  Favourite,  or  The  Duke  of  Lerma'.^°  As  this  is,  of 
the  seventeenth  century  romantic  opinions,  about  the  clearest 
and  most  specific,  we  may  quote  in  full : 

"To  show  therefore  upon  what  ill  grounds  they  dictate  laws 
for  dramatic  poesy,  I  shall  endeavor  to  make  it  evident  that 
there's  no  such  thing  as  what  they  all  pretend ;  for,  if  strictly  and 
duly  weighed,  'tis  as  impossible  for  one  stage  to  present  two 
houses  or  two  rooms  truly  as  two  centuries  or  kingdoms,  and  as 
impossible  that  five  hours,  or  four  and  twenty  hours  should  be 
two  hours  and  a  half  as  that  a  thousand  hours  or  years  should  be 
less  than  what  they  are,  the  greatest  part  of  time  to  be  compre- 
hended in  the  less;  for  all  being  impossible,  they  are  none  of 
them  nearest  the  truth  or  nature  of  what  they  present,  for  im- 
possibilities are  all  equal,  and  admit  no  degrees." 

Ten  years  later  we  have  the  romantic  criticism  of  the  Hudi- 
hras:^^ 

For  all  a  rhetorician's  rules 

Teach  nothing  but  to  name  his  tools. 

Or  again,  more  definitely  :^^ 

Whoever  will  regard  poetic  fury, 
"When  it  is  once  found  idiot  by  a  jury ; 
And  every  pert  and  arbitrary  fool 
Can  all  poetic  license  overrule ; 
Assume  a  barbarous  tyranny  to  handle 
The  muses  worse  than  ostrogoth  or  vandal ; 
Make  'em  submit  to  verdict  and  report. 
And  stand  or  fall  to  th'  orders  of  a  court? 
Going  back  now  a  little  in  date  we  come  to  the  scattered  ro- 
mantic elements  in  Dryden's  writings.""'^     In  the  Essay  of  Dra- 
matic Poesy  there  is  [Neander — Dry  den — speaking]  a  confession 
of  the  bankruptcy  of  classicism  f*  but  the  note  is  one  of  mere 
disillusion  rather  than  of  revolt.    In  the  Defense  of  an  Essay  of 


50.  Cf.   the  passages  previously  quoted  from  Dryden   concerning   unity   of   time. 

51.  (1678?). 

52.  See   Sp.    II,    278. 

53.  Mr.  Bohn  distinguishes  in  Dryden's  criticism  four  types:  1.  Romantic;  2. 
French  Rationalistic  or  Xeoclassic;  3.  English  Rationalistic;  4.  Historical.  On  Dryden's 
ronianticim,   s(?e  W.\lie  I.  c.   51. 

54.  (1668).     K.  I,  99. 


The  Rule  of  Law  23 

Dramatic  Poeay^^  he  expresses  his  if^noranee  of  "any  other  foun- 
dation of  dramatic  poesy  than  the  imitation  of  nature."  This  is 
a  rather  common  profession  among  classicists.  But  in  the  Preface 
to  An  Evening's  Love,  or  the  Mock  Aatrologcr,  we  have  a — 
probably  fleeting — mood  of  open  revolt:"^  "Why  should  there  be 
any  Ipse  dixit  in  our  poetry,  any  more  than  there  is  in  our 
philosophy?" 

Another  distinct  pronouncement  for  romanticism  occurs  in 
his  Heads  of  an  Answer  to  Rymer,^''  where  he  admits  that  types 
of  art  may  vary  according  to  the  climate,  age,  and  disposition  of 
a  people  for  whom  the  poet  writes,  adding  that  Shakespeare  and 
Fletcher  succeeded  because  they  wrote  for  their  own  age.°® 

About  the  most  distinctly  romantic  expression  of  Drj'den 
though  occurs  in  his  Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Paintinq.^^  The 
passage  with  its  complementary  contradiction — characteristic 
of  the  self-contradictory  Dryden — has  been  noted.  Sir  "William 
Temple,®"  about  this  time,  becomes  skeptical  as  to  French  rules, 
and  thinks  they  cause  poetry  to  lose  its  spirit  and  grace.  But  it 
is  doubtful  if  this  is  more  than  a  protest  against  an  excessive 
number  of  rules. 

These  slight  notes  of  revolt  had  but  little  influence  upon  the 
succeeding  century,  but  their  inherent  reasonableness,  and  the 
attack  they  made  upon  the  classical  standards,  forced  a  sort  of 
compromise,  which  modern  writers  have  somewhat  superfluously 
called  rationalism.  Just  what  this  compromise  was  cannot  be 
determined  from  the  texts  \x\X\i  any  exactness.  The  definition  of 
rationalism  is,  however,  approximately  this.  If  a  man  draw  from 
traditions  a  hard  and  fast  rule  for  action  in  a  drama,  he  is  a 
classicist :  if  another  say  there  can  be  no  absolute  rule,  and  that 
any  action  which  pleases  is  good,  we  have  a  romanticist  critic : 


55.  (10)68).     K.   I,    123. 

56.  (1671).  K.  I,  138.  C/.  also  Bohn.  87.  Like  bo  many  of  Dryden's  pro- 
nouncpincnts,  this  is  suscoptible  of  a  different  interpretation.  Mr.  Bohn  (p.  96) 
quotes  the  dosing  paragraph  of  the  Defense  of  the  Epilogue  as  a  romantic  manifesta- 
tion; but  it  seems  to  me  an  unmistakably  classical  one.  The  purport  is.  however, 
ambiguous  at   best. 

57.  Bohn,    108. 

58.  Cf.  Pope's  .similar  conclusion  regarding  Shakespeare.  Cited  on  p.  11.  Note. 
(Preface   to   his   edition    of    Shakespeare.) 

59.  See   p.    18. 

60.  Of  rortnj.      Works.   Aol.    Ill,    Loiidoii    1770,   p.   404. 


24  The  Rise  of  Classical  Eyiglish  Criticism 

the  rationalist  eomproniises;  he  maintains,  like  Dryden,  that 
while  to  please  and  to  follow  nature  are  the  primary  aims,  a 
writer  cannot  succeed  in  either  unless  he  knows  the  rules;  unlike 
Dryden  though,  he  admits  that  the  rules  may  be  modified  as  ex- 
perience shows  modification  to  be  necessary. 

In  practice  the  dividing  lines  between  these  classes  of  critics 
is  obscure.  And  when  a  writer  becomes  slightly  illogical,  he  can 
easily  be.  all  three  at  once;  as  Dryden  was.  For  these  reasons, 
and  because  rationalism  is  not  a  type  of  criticism  but  a  secondary 
blending  of  two  types,  I  prefer  to  eliminate  the  term;  but  have 
retained  it  to  describe  a  few  symptoms  which  cannot  be  set  down 
as  either  romanticist  or  classicist  for  the  reason  that  they  are 
both. 

Perhaps  the  neatest  example  of  early  rationalism — neatest 
because  it  strikes  fundamental  truth  wdth  naive  precision,  yet  with 
novelty, — comes  from  Milton:**^  "They  only  will  best  judge  who 
are  not  luiacquainted  with  JEschlylus,  Sophocles,  and  Euripides, 
the  three  tragic  poets  unequalled  yet  by  any,  and  the  best  rule 
to  all  who  endeavor  to  write  tragedy."  The  idea  that  the  man 
is — presumably — to  choose  his  own  rules,  but  that  he  must  be 
"not  unacquainted"  with  the  ancients,  may  be  trite  to  us,  but  is, 
for  its  age,  strikingly  reasonable. 

The  French  adopted  a  course  in  this  matter  which  was  a 
compromise  not  so  much  between  two  systems  as  between 
im])ractical  law  which  is  ideal  but  unrealizable  and  the  weak- 
nesses of  human  audiences.''^  Corneille"^  held  that  rules,  when 
not  entirely  justifiable,  had  sometimes  to  be  upheld,  because  the 
people  were  used  to  them  and  expected  them.  Elsewhere  we 
have  the  same."* 

Besides  the  rationalistic,  classical,  and  romantic,  there  is 
another  way  of  conceiving  art,  the  realistic.  As  all  criticism  pro- 
fesses to  be  rational,  so  all  art  aims  at  being  real.  So  between 
realism  and  classicism,  as  between  rationalism  and  classicism,  we 
cannot  draw  a  very  distinct  line.  Yet  realism,  in  its  modern 
form  at  any  rate,  is  a  distinctly  different  type  of  art.     Unlike 


61.  Preface   to  Samson   Ayonistes   (1671).      Sp.    1,   209.      Cf.   also   Sp.   Ixvi,   Ixvii, 
and   Ixviii. 

62.  Much  of  Davenynt's  Preface  to  Oondibert  is  in  this  spirit. 

63.  DixriiurH  dp  la    Trnyedie    (1660). 

64.  Cf.   Mere,  quoted  by   Sp.   xcvi. 


The  Rule  of  I.axu  25 

both  elassii'ism  and  rationalism,  it  admits  no  rules,  but  only 
working  hypotheses.  But  unlike  romanticism  it  sets  sharp 
bounds  to  the  permissible  activities  of  art.  Art  is  to  be  scien- 
tifically historical  as  to  the  past,  and  scientifically  descriptive  of 
the  present."'^  The  impossible,  even  the  fairy-tale  or  fairy  drama, 
such  as  Midsummer-Night's  Dream,  are  taboo.  It  is  scarcely  to 
our  present  purpose  to  enter  upon  this  phase  of  realism,  as 
represented  by  De  Maupassant,  Tolstoy,  Ilauptmann,  or  Thomas 
Hardy.  For  of  such  realism  we  have  only  tlie  faintest  glimmer 
in  the  period  we  are  considering.  We  have,  however,  much  dis- 
cussion of  the  older  problem  of  truth  in  art;  and  this  problem 
was  the  direct  progenitor  of  modern  realism. 

The  oft-repeated  Aristotelian  doctrine®*^  that  art  is  imitation 
of  nature  is  realistic.  Webbe  in  his  table  of  canons  quotes  the 
objection  of  Horace  to  composite  animals,  such  as  "a  woman's 
head,  a  horse  neck,  the  body  of  a  divers  colored  bird,  and  many 
members  of  sundry  creatures  compact  together,  whose  legs  end- 
ing like  a  fish 's  tail, ' ' — such  he  thinks  are  to  be  eschewed  in  art. 
In  the  same  place  we  read  that  speech  likewise  should  avoid  such 
diversity,  a  classical  idea,  draAvn  from  the  preceding  by  a  false 
analogy.  But  again,  in  another  of  these  canons  we  are  told  that 
speech  must  not  exceed  credit.  These  ideas  with  others  of  the 
same  sort,  in  the  same  place  [q.  v.]  belong,  however,  more  to  the 
doctrine  of  decorum  than  to  realism."^  In  the  next  century®^  the 
problem  is  more  insistent,  but  still  bound  up  with  decorum.*' 
The  arch-realist,  because  the  most  scientific  writer  of  the  period, 
is  Bacon.^°  But  as  Bacon  believes  little  in  any  fiction,  his  views 
must  be  taken  as  scientific  rather  than  artistic.  Ben  Jonson^^ 
lays  stress  upon  the  element  of  realism  in  decorum ;  decorum,  he 
thinks,  Sidney  violated,  because  he  "made  every  one  speak  as 
well  as  himself."    Again"  he  criticises  adversely  artificers  who 


65.  The    distinction    between    modern    realism    and    romanticism    also    involves    the 
problem  of  the  sordidly  ugly,  which  the  realist  freely  admits  to  his  art. 

66.  Cf.    e.    g.    Sidney.      Sm.    I,    158.      Puttenham,    Sm.    II,    3.      Also    Dryden, 
Lisideius  speaking,   K.  I,   36. 

67.  Cf.   also   King  James  VI.      Treatvie   on   Verse    (1584).      Sm.    I,    219. 
68     Cf.   Sp.   xxxii,   Ixv. 

69.  For  example,  see  Milton,   Preface  to  Samson  Agonistfs    (1671).    Sp.   I,   209. 

70.  Advancement  of  Learning  (1605).     Sp.  I,  6. 

71.  Conrer.sation.i  with  Drummond.    (1619).   Saintsbury.   II.    199. 

72.  Timber    (1620  35?).      Sp.   I,   29. 


26  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

"i-jin  liit  nothing  but  smooth  cheeks;  they  cannot  express  rough- 
ness or  gravity,"  an  implied  theory  which  in  its  natural  conclu- 
sions would  go  far  to  demolish  classical  idealism  in  favor  of 
realism.  Davenant,  as  quoted  by  Dryden,"  who  doubts  it  all, 
has  a  similar  idea:  An  heroic  poem  "ought  to  be  dressed  in  a 
more  familiar  and  easy  shape ;  more  fitted  to  the  common  actions 
and  passions  of  human  life;  and,  in  short,  more  like  a  glass  of 
nature,  showing  us  ourselves  in  our  ordinary  habits,  and  figuring 
a  more  practicable  virtue  to  us,  than  was  done  by  the  ancients  or 
moderns."  Hobbes,^*  who  so  often  agrees  with  Bacon,  believes 
that  the  poet  should  be  faithful  to  fact,  for  both  the  poet  and  the 
historian  write  only  (or  should  do)  matter  of  fact."  Phillips 
likewise  sticks  to  the  real,  when  he  writes  :^^  ' '  It  would  be  absurd 
in  a  poet  to  set  his  hero  upon  romantic  actions  (let  his  courage 
be  what  it  will)  exceeding  human  strength  and  power,  as  to 
fight  singly  against  whole  armies  and  come  off  unhurt,  at  least 
if  a  mortal  man,  and  not  a  deity  armed  with  power  divine. ' ' 

Dryden  exhibits  almost  none  of  the  symptoms  of  realism; 
and  is  frequently  extreme  in  his  opposition.''*' 

But  while  these  questions  of  truth  were  being  discussed  in 
such  strains,  realism  of  the  modern  type,  except  in  the  scientific 
doctrines  of  Bacon  and  Hobbes,  was  conspicuous  by  a  total 
absence. 


73.  Essay  of  Heroic  Plays    (1672).     K.   I,    151. 

74.  The  y utiles  of  an  Heroic  Poem   (1675).      Sp.  II,   70 

75.  Preface   to   Thcatrara  Poetaruni    (1675).      Sp.   II,    268. 

70.  C/.  for  an  example  his  defense  of  chini-ras,  etc..  Apology  for  Heroic  Poetry 
and  Poetic  License.      (1677).     K.  I,  187. 


CHAPTER  II: 
THE  PURPOSE  OF  LITERARY  ART 

To  primitive  man  literary  art  was  inspiration.  The  idea  re- 
appears witli  apparent  sincerity  in  earlier  p]nj?Iish  criticism,^ 
most  naively  and  therefore  most  genuinely  in  Thomas  AVilson's 
The  Art  of  Rhetoric,  one  chapter  of  whieh^  bears  the  title,  fJlo- 
quence  First  Given  by  God,  after  Lost  hy  Man,  and  Last  Re- 
paired by  God  Again. 

The  Elizabethan  aj?e  though  was  not  troubled  much  by  re- 
ligious ideas.  Christianity  sat  light  upon  it ;  and  most  of  the 
writers  Avere  half  pagan  in  spirit,  and  religious  rather  as 
formal  conformists  than  as  enthusiasts.  In  criticism  this  spirit 
showed  itself  in  the  copious  borrowing  of  ideas  from  Aristotle, 
and  the  treatment  of  all  art  in  a  manner  purely  secular. 

Among  the  motives  which  are  adduced  to  explain  art.  one  of 
the  most  fundamental  is  the  idea  which  Aristotle  attached  to 
the  word  Ka6ap(n<;.  Precisely  what  this  idea  was  is  matter  of 
dispute.^    We  can,  however,  get  the  sense  approximately  from 


1.  Sm.  xxiii.  Citation  from  Lodge.  His  other  examples  are  worthless,  throuph 
fallacy  of  definition.  Cf.  also  Francis  Meres'  citation  of  Cicero.  [  Sm.  11.  313]. 
Also  Wilson's  Art  of  Rhetoric:  Collins,  J.  Churton,  Esaayn  and  Literarij  I'nigments. 
N.  Y. :  Uutton,  p.  3.  Wilson's  book  was  said  to  have  been  published  in  lo.ol,  but 
the  first  known  edition  appeared  in  1553   [Collins,  p.  9]. 

2.  Chapter  reprinted  by  Collins;  I.  c. 

3.  For  a  general  discussion,  see  Bosanquet,  .Uslhetic,  p.  64. 

Max  Nordau's  explanation  of  the  caases  of  art  [Degeneration,  Bk.  Ill,  Ch. 
iii.]  explains  psychologically  and  physiologically  a  principle  of  practically  the  same 
nature: 

"Activity  of  imitation  (and  the  plastic  arts  are  at  bottom  nothing  but  residuary 
traces  of  imitative  movements)  has  consequently  an  immediate  organic  aim,  vii., 
the  freeing  of  the  nervous  system  from  an  excitation  set  up  in  it  by  some  visual 
cause." 

Yet  excitation,  caused  by  internal  organic  state,  may  also  give  ri.se  to  "relaxa- 
tion of  the  nerve-centers  overcharged  with  motor  impulsions,  as  in  the  dance,  in 
outcries,  song  and  music,  and  in  p,".rt  such  as  disburden  the  centers  of  ideation,  like 
declamation,   lyric   and   epic  poetry." 

"Hence  imitation  is  not  the  source  of  tlie  arts,  but  one  of  the  media  of  art : 
the  real  source  of  art  is  emotion.  Artistic  activity  is  not  its  own  end,  but  it  is 
of  direct  utility  to  the  artist;  its  satisfies  the  need  of  his  organism  to  transform 
its  emotions  into  movement.  He  creates  the  work  of  art,  not  for  its  own  sake,  but 
to  free  his  nervous  system  from  a  tension.  The  expression,  which  has  become  a 
commonplace,  is  psychoi)hysiologically  accurate,  viz.,  the  artist  writes,  paints, 
sings,   or   dances  the  burden   of  some   idea  or   feeling  cflf  his   mind." 

To  this  must  be  added  a  second  end  "the  objective  end  of  acting  upon  others," 
the  impulse  of  sympathy,  of  creating  sympathetic  emotions  in  others." 

—  27  — 


28  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

tljo  last  words  of  this  sentence,  vvliieh  Bosanquet  has  paraphrased 
from  the  Poetics: 

"Trajjedy  is  a  representation  (lit.  imitation)  of  an  action 
noble  and  complete  in  itself,  and  of  appreciable  magnitude,  in 
language  of  special  fascination,  using  different  kinds  of  utter- 
ance in  the  different  parts,  given  through  performers  and  not 
by  means  of  narration  and  producing  by  (the  stimulation  of)  pity 
and  fear,  the  alleviating  discharge  of  emotions  of  that  nature." 
This  idea  is  echoed  by  Puttenham.*  If  a  man  feels  great  joy,  he 
may  relieve  himself  in  poetry : 

"And  many  be  the  joys  and  consolations  of  the  heart,  but 
none  greater  than  such  as  he  may  utter  and  discover  by  some 
convenient  means:  even  as  to  suppress  and  hide  a  man's  mirth, 
and  not  to  have  therein  a  partaker,  or  at  leastwise  a  witness,  is  no 
little  grief  and  infelicity." 

Similarly,  to  express  grief  relieves  it,  for  it  is  "a  piece  of  joy 
to  be  able  to  lament  with  ease,  and  freely  to  pour  forth  a  man's 
inward  sorrows  and  the  griefs  wherewith  his  mind  is  sur- 
charged." Moreover,  "this  was  a  very  necessary  device  of  the 
poet  and  a  fine,  besides  his  poetry  to  play  also  the  physician,  and 
not  only  by  applying  a  medicine  to  the  ordinary  sickness  of 
mankind,  but  by  making  the  very  grief  itself  (in  part) )  cure  of 
the  disease."  Thus  poetry  is,  says  Puttenham,''  a  sort  of  medi- 
cine, homeopathic  medicine,  we  would  say,  in  which  like  cures 
like.  Later  Milton*'  repeats  the  same  idea  to  prove  Aristotle's 
dictum,  which  he  cites.  Nature  uses  in  this  medicine  "things  of 
melancholic  hue  and  quality"  against  melancholy,  and  so  on. 

To  return  to  Puttenham,  though :  This  cheerful  and  rather 
humanly  facetious  critic  not  only  specifies  the  expression  of  joy 
and  grief  as  the  function  of  poetry,  but,  like  a  good  pedant, 
proceeds  to  classify  the  various  occasions  on  which  one  may 
express  these  feelings.  One  may  be  publicly  joyful  for  the 
peace  of  a  country  [Triumphal  poetry],  joyful  for  an  honorable 
victory  against  a  foreign  enemy  [Triumphal],  joyful  on  the 
occasion  of  solemn  feasts,  coronations,  instalments  of  honorary 
orders     [Encomia],    weddings     [Epithalamies],     birthdays    of 


4.    The  Art  of  Enf/Uxh  Pofxi/   [1.589].  Bk.  I.  Sm.   II,  47,  49. 

o.    I.    r. 

6.    Preface  to  Samson  Agoninten    [1671].   Sp.   I,   207. 


The  Purpose  of  Literary  Art  29 

princes'  cliildrcn  [(lorH'tliliacaJ,  ciitcrtainincnts  in  court  and  sim- 
ilar affairs.  i\lan  may  also  be  sorrowful,  and  poetic,  on  the  occa- 
sion of:  death  of  parents,  of  friends,  of  allies,  of  children, 
overthrows  and  discomforts  in  battle,  the  subversion  of  towns, 
the  desolation  of  countries,  the  loss  of  ^oods  and  worldly  promo- 
tions, honor  and  renown,  and  the  torments  of  forlorn  or  ill-be- 
stowed love.  On  all  these  occasions  may  a  man  cure  the  disorder 
by  poetic  expression.  But  the  poet  is  apparently  an  expensive 
doctor  to  be  called  in  only  in  extreme  eases, ^  for  "Such  of  these 
griefs  as  mip:ht  be  refrained  or  helped  by  wisdom  and  the  party's 
own  good  endeavor,  the  poet  gave  none  order  to  sorrow  them." 

This  last  is  an  Anglicized  version  of  the  restrictions  which 
the  ancients  put  about  the  subject  matter  of  art.  According  to 
the  ancients  a  king  should  not  appear  in  tragedy  unless  royally; 
for  he,  as  a  figure  of  state,  has  a  dignity  that  demands  action 
either  nol)ler  or  worse  than  that  characteristic  of  ordinary  men. 
So  his  troubles  must  be  royal  troubles.  In  what  appears  to  be 
the  English  adaptation  of  this  [though  it  may  be  simply  the  in- 
vention of  Puttenham]  the  lesser  woes  which  are  cured  by  the 
smaller,  business  adaptations  of  life  are  not  dignified  enough 
for  art. 

This  doctrine  of  the  katharsis  we  find  after  the  restoration 
in  a  French  version.  It  is,  it  is  needless  perhaps  to  observe,  not 
the  original  doctrine  but  a  distortion.     In  Comeille*  we  read: 

"La  pitie  d'un  malheur  ou  nous  voyons  tomber  nos  sem- 
blables  nous  porte  a  la  crainte  d'un  pareil  pour  nous;  cette 
crainte,  au  desir  de  I'eviter;  et  ee  desir,  a  purger,  moderer,  rec- 
tifier, et  meme  deraciner  en  nous  la  passion  qui  plonge  a  nos 
yeux  dans  ee  malheur  les  personnes  que  nous  plaignons,  par  cette 
raison  commune,  mais  naturelle  et  indubitable,  (pie  jiour  eviter 
I'effet  it  faut  retrancher  la  cause." 

Racine  and  Rapin*'  held  the  same  view.  It  is  echoed  almast 
without  change  by  Dryden.'" 

Much  more  important  than  this  idea  of  the  Aristotelian 
katharsis,  in  the  earlier  English  criticism,  is  the  conception  of 


7.  I.    c. 

8.  Duieoiirs  des  Trovi  Vnit^ti  [1660]. 

9.  Sp.,  Lit.  Crit.  in  the  Renai^nance,  75. 

10.  Preface  to   Troiltm  and  Crinmida    [1679].   K.   I,   209. 


30  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

art  as  didactic  machinery,  a  sort  of  higher  rhetoric,  of  little  if 
any  use  in  itself,  but  important  as  an  engine  for  making  clear 
and  inculcating  salutary  truths.  This  inculcating  involves  two — 
sometimes  distinct — operations,  the  pleasant  presentation  of 
principle  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  upholding  on  the  other  of  an 
ideal  so  beautiful  that  the  reader  instinctively  follows  it.  In 
theoretical  rhetoric  these  two  functions  may  be  kept  separate ;  in 
the  theories  of  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries  this  is 
well-nigh  impossible.     They  are  here  treated  together. 

This  didacticism  was  mainly  classical  rather  than  Puritan.^^ 
The  Puritan  attack  was  against  "lying"  art^'  and  against  im- 
moral" art. 

The  earliest  English  advocate  of  a  thoroughly  and  con- 
sistently didactic  art  was  Philip  Sidney.  "But  even  in  the 
most  excellent  determination  of  goodness,"  says  Sidney,  in  his 
Apology  for  Poetry, '^'^  "what  philosopher's  counsel  can  so 
readily  direct  a  prince,  as  the  feigned  Cyrus  in  Xenophen?  or  a 
virtuous  man  in  all  fortunes,  as  Aeneas  in  Virgil?" 

Or  again : 

"The  poet  is  indeed  the  right  popular  philosopher,  whereof 
Esop's  tales  give  good  proof;  whose  pretty  allegories,  stealing 
under  the  formal  tales  of  beasts,  make  many,  more  beastly  than 
beasts,  begin  to  hear  the  sound  of  virtue  from  these  dumb  speak- 
ers." 

The  whole  of  this  famous  Apology  is  also  deeply  infused  with 
calm  but  burning  adoration  of  ideal  perfection,  especially  in 
human  character.  As  it  is  impossible  to  give  the  spirit  of  this  in 
short  excerpts,  the  reader  will  pardon  the  introduction  of  some 
more  lengthy  passages.^'' 


11.  Spenser's    moral    teaching    theories    were    in    all    probability    Puritan.       But 

Sidney's  could  scarcely  have  been  deeply  affected  by  such  influence. 

12.  Sm.   xix-xx. 

13.  Cf.  Gosson's  School  of  Abune.  Gosson  professed  to  attack  only  the  abuses 
of  art,  not  the  substance;  but  he  considered  the  theatre  so  corrupt  that  a  sober 
countenance,  good  friends  and  modesty  at  home  would  all  not  atone  for  the  evil 
of  a  visit  to  it.  Comedies  he  classed  with  dicing,  car^-playing  and  bowling  alleys, 
and  repented  abjectly  for  having  himself  written  comedies  before  his  reformation. 
[Arber  Reprint,   pp.  41,   58,   65]. 

14.  [1583.  Pub.  1595].  Sm.  I,  166  7.  The  Apology  for  Poetry  was  in  a 
measure  a  reply  to  Gosson's  School  of  Abuie. 

15.  Jb.  172.     See  also  Sm.  I,  159,  167,  168,  180. 


The  Purpose  of  Literary  Art  31 

"Now  therein  [in  the  inciting  to  good  action]  of  all  sciences 
(I  speak  still  of  humane,  and  according  to  the  humane  conceits) 
is  our  poet  the  monarch.  For  he  doth  not  only  show  the  way,  but 
giveth  so  sweet  a  prospect  into  the  way,  as  will  entice  any  man 
to  enter  into  it.  Nay,  he  doth,  as  if  your  journey  should  lie 
through  a  fair  vineyard,  at  the  first  give  you  a  cluster  of  grapes, 
that,  full  of  that  taste,  you  may  long  to  pass  further.  He  begin- 
neth  not  with  obscure  definitions,  which  must  blur  the  margcnt 
with  interpretations,  and  load  the  memory  with  doubtfulness; 
but  he  cometh  to  you  with  words  sent  in  delightful  proportion, 
either  accompanied  with,  or  prepared  for,  the  well  enchanting 
skill  of  music;  and  with  a  tale  forsooth  he  cometh  unto  you,  with 
a  tale  which  holdetli  children  from  play,  and  old  men  from  the 
chimney  corner.  And,  pretending  no  more,  doth  intend  tlie 
winning  of  the  mind  from  wickedness  to  virtue:  even  as  the 
child  is  often  brought  to  take  most  Avholesome  things  by  liiding 
them  in  such  other  as  have  a  pleasant  taste :  which,  if  one  should 
begin  to  tell  them  the  nature  of  the  aloes  or  rhubarb  they  should 
receive,  would  sooner  take  their  physic  at  their  ears  than  at  their 
mouth.  So  it  is  in  men  (most  of  which  are  childish  in  the  l)ost 
things,  till  they  be  cradled  in  their  graves)  :  glad  they  will  be  to 
hear  the  tales  of  Hercules,  Achilles,  Cyrus  and  .Eneas;  and  hear- 
ing them,  must  needs  hear  the  right  description  of  wisdom, 
valor,^°  and  justice ;  which,  if  they  had  been  barely,  that  is  to  say 
philosophically,  set  out,  they  would  swear  they  be  brought  to 
school  again." 

Moreover,  the  end  of  this  instruction  is  character:*^ 
"This  purifying  of  wit,  this  enriching  of  memory,  enabling 
of  judgment,  and  enlarging  of  conceit,  which  commonly  we  call 
learning,  under  what  name  soever  it  come  forth,  or  to  what  im- 
mediate end  soever  it  be  directed,  the  final  end  is  to  lead  and 
draw  us  to  as  high  a  perfection  as  our  degenerate  souls,  made 
worse  by  their  clayey  lodgings,  can  be  capable  of.  This,  accord- 
ing to  the  inclination  of  the  man,  bred  many  formed  impressions. 
For  some  that  thought  this  felicity  principally  to  be  gotten  by 
Imowledge,  and  no  knowledge  to  be  so  high  and  heavenly  as  ac- 
quaintance with  the  stars,  gave  themselves  to  astronomy ;  otliers 


IG.  The  original  reads  ralure,  whiih  might  also  have  the  sense  of  laluf. 
17.   lb.  p.  100. 


32  The  Rise  of  Classical  Eu'^lish  Criticism 

persundinj]:  themselves  to  be  demigods  if  they  knew  the  causes  of 
things,  became  natural  and  supernatural  philosophers;  some  an 
admirable  delight  drew  to  music;  and  some  the  certainty  of  de- 
monstration to  the  mathematics;  but  all,  one  and  other,  having 
this  scope — to  know,  and  by  knowledge  to  lift  up  the  mind  from 
the  dungeon  of  the  body  to  the  enjoying  his  own  divine  essence. 
l>ut  when  by  the  balance  of  experience  it  was  found  that  the  as- 
tronomer looking  to  the  stars  might  fall  into  a  ditch,  that  the 
enquiring  philosopher  might  be  blind  in  himself,  and  the  mathe- 
matician might  draw  forth  a  straight  line  with  a  crooked  heart; 
then  lo,  did  proof,  the  overruler  of  opinions,  make  manifest  that 
all  these  are  but  serving  sciences,  which  as  they  have  each  a 
private  end  in  themselves,  so  yet  are  they  all  directed  to  the 
highest  end  of  the  mistress  knowledge,  by  the  Greeks  called 
Arkitecktonike,  which  stands  (as  I  think)  in  the  knowledge  of 
a  man 's  self,  in  the  ethic  and  politic  consideration,  with  the  end  of 
well  doing  and  not  of  well  knowing  only. ' ' 

Among  all  these  the  poet  is  ''moderator"  and  the  first  as  the 
setter-forth  of  goodness  and  inciter  to  good  actions.  Another  in- 
teresting feature  of  the  whole  doctrine  is  the  conception  of  ideal- 
ism not  merely  as  a  vision  of  perfection,  but  as  the  setting  forth 
of  an  idea  :^^ 

"The  poet,  disdaining  to  be  tied  to  any  such  subjection  [to 
nature],  lifted  up  with  the  vigor  of  his  own  invention,  doth  grow 
in  effect  another  nature,  in  making  things  either  better  than 
nature  bringeth  forth,  or,  quite  anew,  forms  such  as  never  were 
in  nature,  as  the  heroes,  demigods,  cyclops.  Chimeras,  furies,  and 
such  like :  so  as  he  goeth  hand  in  hand  with  nature,  not  inclosed 
within  the  narrow  warrant  of  her  gifts,  but  freely  ranging  only 
within  the  zodiac  of  his  own  wit. 

Nature  never  set  forth  the  earth  in  so  rich  tapestry  as  divers 
poets  have  done,  neither  with  pleasant  rivers,  fruitful  trees, 
sweet  smelling  flowers,  nor  whatsoever  else  may  make  the  too 
much  loved  earth  more  lovely.^^  Her  world  is  brazen,  the  poets 
only  deliver  a  golden.  But  let  those  things  alone  and  go  to  man, 
for  whom  as  the  other  things  are,  so  it  seemeth  in  him  her  utter- 


18.  Ih.   156. 

19.  This  passage  is  imitated  closely  by  Addison  in  one  of  the  Spectator  papers. 
418.   June   30,    1712. 


The  Purpose  of  Literary  Art  33 

most  cunning  is  employed,  and  know  whether  she  have  brought 
forth  so  true  a  lover  as  Theagines,  so  constant  a  friend  as 
Pilades,  so  valiant  a  man  as  Orlando,  so  right  a  prince  as  Xeno- 
phon  's  Cyrus,  so  excellent  a  man  every  way  as  Virgil 's  yEneas : 
neither  let  this  be  jestingly  conceived,  because  the  works  of  the 
one  be  essential,  the  other,  in  imitation  or  fiction  ;  for  any  under- 
standing knoweth  the  skill  of  the  artificer  standeth  in  that  idea 
or  fore-conceit  of  the  work,  and  not  in  the  work  itself.  And  that 
the  poet  hath  that  idea  is  manifest,  by  delivering  them  forth 
in  such  excellence  as  he  hath  imagined  them.  Wliich  delivering 
forth  also  is  not  wholly  imaginative,  as  we  are  wont  to  say  by 
them  that  build  castles  in  the  air:  but  so  far  substantially  it 
worketh,  not  only  to  make  a  Cyrus,  which  had  been  but  a  particu- 
lar excellence,  as  nature  might  have  done,  but  to  bestow  a  Cyrus 
upon  the  world,  to  make  many  Cyruses,  if  they  ^vill  learn  aright 
why  and  how  that  maker  made  him. ' ' 

A  few  years  after  this  was  written,  and  before  it  was  pub- 
lished, the  platitudinous  Webbe  wrote  that  the  best  kind  of 
poetry  should  join  "commodity"  to  delight.  He  quotes  from 
Horace  -r^ 

"A  poet,  that  he  may  be  perfect,  has  need  to  have  knowledge 
of  that  part  of  philosophy  which  informs  the  life  to  good  man- 
ners. The  other  which  pertains  to  natural  things  is  less  plausible, 
has  fewer  ornaments,  and  is  not  so  profitable."  And  again,  still 
quoting  from  Horace  :^^ 

"It  is  [not]  only  a  point  of  wisdom  to  use  many  and  choice 
elegant  words,  but  to  imderstand  also  and  to  set  forth  things 
which  pertain  to  the  happy  end  of  man's  life." 

Always  side  by  side  with  Webbe 's  ponderous  treatise  the  his- 
torian will  think  of  Puttenham's,  as  of  the  talk  of  a  genial  and 
humorous  man  after  that  of  a  bore.  As  Puttenham  is  more 
swxetly  reasonable  in  temper,  so  he  is,  despite  an  occasional  ec- 
centricity, in  theory.  According  to  his  theorj'  the  poet  is  to  do 
good,  but  do  it,  as  it  were,  by  stealth.-  Poetry  "inveigles  the 
judgment  of  man,  and  carries  his  opinion  this  way  and  that  whith- 
ersoever the  heart  by  impression  of  the  ear  shall  be  most  affect  iini- 


20.  /.  c.  Sm.  I,  295.     Canons  of  Horace. 

21.  p.  301.   Canons  of  Horace. 

22.  Sm.   II,   8. 


34  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

atel}-  bent  and  directed."  He  urges,  however,  that  poetry  shall 
l>e  used  for  no  base  end.-^  Again  :-*  There  is  a  fit  subject-matter 
of  poetry  "which  to  my  intent  is  whatsoever  witty  and  delicate 
conceit  of  man  meet  or  worthy  to  be  put  in  written  verse  [sic] 
for  any  necessary  use  of  the  present  time,  or  good  instruction 
of  the  posterity."  Immediately  after  the  pedantry  of  his  age 
crops  out  and  he  begins  to  classify  the  occasions  for  poetry.  But 
note  the  width  of  his  limits,  and  the  comparatively  minor  role 
which  the  didactic  purpose  plays, 

"But  the  chief  and  principal  is  the  laud,  honor,  and  glory  of 
the  immortal  gods  (I  speak  now  in  phrase  of  the  Gentiles)  : 
secondly  the  worthy  gests  [stories]  of  noble  princes,  the  memo- 
rial and  registry  of  all  great  fortunes,  the  praise  of  virtue  and 
reproof  of  vice,  the  instruction  of  moral  doctrines,  the  revealing 
of  sciences,  natural  and  other  profitable  arts,  the  redress  of 
boisterous  and  sturdy  courages  by  persuasion,  the  consolation 
and  repose  of  temperate  minds :  finally,  the  common  solace  of 
mankind  in  all  his  travails  and  cares  of  this  transitory  life ;  and 
in  this  last  sort,  being  used  for  recreation  only,  may  allowably 
bear  matter  not  always  of  the  gravest  or  of  any  great  commodity 
or  profit,  but  rather  in  some  sort  vain,  dissolute,  or  wanton,  so 
it  be  not  very  scandalous  and  of  evil  example." 

In  the  same  year  Nash,^"'  in  his  characteristically  racy — if 
vulgar — style,  wrote : 

"A  man  may  bawl  until  his  voice  be  hoarse,  exhort  with 
tears  till  his  tongue  ache  and  his  eyes  be  dry,  repeat  that  he 
would  persuade  till  his  staleness  does  secretly  call  for  a  cloak 
bag,  and  yet  move  no  more  than  if  he  had  been  all  that  while 
mute,  if  his  speech  be  not  seasoned  with  eloquence  and  adorned 
with  elocution's  assistance.  Nothing  is  more  odious  to  the 
auditor  than  the  artless  tongue  of  a  tedious  dolt,  which  dulls  the 
delight  of  hearing  and  slackens  the  desire  of  remembering." 

Also  in  the  same  year,  a  greater  than  either  Puttenham  or 
Nash  was  to  throw  the  weight  of  his  name  on  the  side  of  didactic 
poetry.  We  are  inclined  sometimes  to  overlook  the  didactic 
morals  of  the  Faerie  Queene  for  the  sake  of  its  charms.     But 


23.  lb.    24. 

24.  The  Art  of  Em/lixh  Poexi/   \ir,891.  Ch.   X.   Sm.   TI,   2.5. 

25.  The  Anatomy  of  Abnurditj/    [Printed    1589].   Sm.   x.xvii,   and   I,   334-335. 


The  Purpose  of  Literary  Art  35 

Spenser  never  forgot  them,  nor  left  any  room  for  ainhitruous 
interpretation.  To  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  he  wrote,-"  a[)pending  the 
letter  to  the  poem : 

"The  general  end  therefore  of  all  the  book  is  to  fashion  a 
gentleman  or  noble  person  in  virtuous  and  gentle  discipline." 

The  remainder  of  the  letter  will  doubtless  be  recalled,  so  need 
not  be  touched  upon  in  detail  here. 

A  few  years  after  this  distinctly  momentous  critical  event. 
Sir  John  Ilarington^^  touched  upon  the  same  matter,  but  con- 
ceived it  in  a  decidedly  more  strenuous  manner.  He  figured  to 
himsel.f  an  heroic  poetry  that  "allureth  them  that  of  themselves 
would  otherwise  loathe  them  to  take  and  swallow  and  digest  the 
wholesome  precepts  of  philosophy,  and  many  times  even  of  the 
true  divinity." 

Again,  in  the  same  treatise,  he  comes  to  one  of  those  rhetori- 
cal tricks  which  we  may  call  the  virtuous  demagoguery  of  art: 

"This  doubtless  is  a  point  of  great  art,  to  draw  a  man  with  a 
continual  thirst  to  read  out  the  whole  work,  and  toward  the 
end  of  the  book  to  close  up  the  diverse  matters  briefly  and 
cleanly. ' ' 

Francis  Meres-^  voices  the  same  idea,  but  in  the  form  of  a 
quotation  from  Plutarch. 

Later  Bacon, -^  with  his  usual  hard  common  sense,  divided 
poetry  into  narrative  which  was  what  we  would  call  scientifi- 
cally historical  or  historically  realistic ;  representative,  or  his- 
tory treated  in  the  present  and  made  visible;  and  allusive  or 
parabolical.  The  parabolical  poetry  is  idealistic,  and  arises  from 
man's  dissatisfaction  with  life.^°  Bacon,  though,  rather  more 
than  suspects  that  this  last  form  of  art  is  primitive.  It  does  well 
enough  for  suggesting  subjects  so  subtle  that  they  cannot  be  put 
scientifically.  For  this  reason  it  was  more  useful  in  primitive 
days  than  now;  for  men  were  then  less  scientific.  In  fact  Bacon 
is  a  realist,  who  somew^hat  reluctantly  grants  an  idealistic  art,  as 
an  useful  concession  to  what  he,  with  ill-concealed  contempt,  be- 


26.  Jan.   23,    1589.      Old  style  chronolopy. 

27.  A    Preface,    or   Rather   a    Brief   Apnlopif   nf   Poetry,   and   of   the    Author    and 
Trannlator,  prefixed  to  his  translation   of  Orlando   Furiono.    [1.591].   Sm.   II,    198. 

28.  Palladia  Tamia    [1598].  Sm.   11,   309. 

29.  Advancement   of  Learning.      Bk.   II.    [1605].   Sp.   I,    16. 

30.  Sp.   xi. 


36  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

lieves  to  be  low  instincts.  Bacon,  therefore,  cannot,  in  this  one  of 
the  fundamentals,  be  called  in  any  sense  a  classicist.  Nor  on  the 
other  hand  does  he  represent  artistic  realism.  His  note  is  the 
scorn  of  a  natural  scientist  for  imaginative  creations,  and  repre- 
sents not  a  literary  but  an  anti-literary  school.^^ 

Here  we  have  a  chronological  gap,  in  which  the  subject  seems 
to  have  flagged.  But  in  1675,  over  three  quarters  of  a  centuiy 
later,  it  was  still  in  vogue ;  for  Edward  Phillips,  in  his  Preface  to 
Theatrum  Poetarum  published  in  that  year,^^  reechoes  the  old 
sentiments,  though  in  less  racy  language.  "Heroic  Poesy  ought 
to  be  the  result  of  all  that  can  be  contrived  of  profit,  delight,  or 
ornament,  either  from  experience  in  human  affairs  or  from  the 
knowledge  of  all  arts  and  sciences."  But  in  the  conclusion  of  the 
sentence  we  catch  a  new  note:  he  continues — "it  being  but 
requisite  that  the  same  work  which  sets  forth  the  highest  acts  of 
kings  and  heroes  should  be  made  fit  to  allure  the  inclinations  of 
such  like  persons  to  a  studious  delight  in  reading  of  those 
things  which  they  are  desired  to  imitate. ' ' 

This  closing  allusion  to  the  acts  of  kings  suggests  an  explana- 
tion of  the^^  gap  in  the  history  of  this  doctrine,  and  of  its  re- 
vival at  this  time.  The  explanation  is  purely  conjectural;  but 
the  idea  of  a  king  in  art  as  typifying  the  highest  ideal  and  so 
spurring  to  imitation  may  well  have  come  from  Corneille.  At 
this  time  the  Puritan  power  had  passed  away,  Dryden  was  in  full 
sway  as  critic  and  poet  laureate,  and  the  literature — and  espe- 
cially the  criticism — of  England  was  thoroughly  imbued  with 
French  classicism. 


31.  In  the  nineteenth  century  we  have  this  view  developed  with  logical  com- 
pleteness in  Peacock's  essay.  The  Four  Ages  of  Poetry,  a  work  best  known  as  the 
provoker  of  Shelley's  Defense  of  Poesy,  but  worthy  of  a  better  fate,  both  as  literature 
and   as   criticism. 

32.  [1675].   Sp.   II,   268. 

33.  Saintsbury  attributes  this  gap  in  critical  writing  to  the  wars  and  the  re- 
sultant disturbances.  But  wars  are  certainly  not  destructive  to  general  literature, 
though  they  may  be  to  critical  writing.  His  evidence  is  [History  of  Criticism,  II. 
p.  365]: 

"Between  the  probable  date  of  Jonson  Timber  (1625-37)  and  the  certain  one 
of  Dryden's  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy  (1668)  we  have  practically  nothing  substantive 
save  the   interesting   prefatory   matter   to  Gondibert    (1650)." 


The  Purpose  of  Literary  Art  37 

In  Dryden  we  find  the  same  didactie  purpose  :''•  In  Uie 
Preface  to  Troilus  and  Cressida  he  says:'" 

"To  instruct  delightfully  is  the  general  end  of  all  poetry." 
He  commends  Horace  as  a  better  instructor  than  Juvenal." 
Horace  "gives  the  most  various  advice  and  most  applicable  to 
all  occasions  which  can  occur  to  us  in  the  course  of  our  lives — 
as  including  in  his  discourses,  not  only  all  the  rules  of  morality, 
but  also  of  civil  conversation."  Again,  he  says  :^^  "The  principal 
end  of  painting  is  to  please,  and  the  chief  design  of  poetry  is  to 
instruct." 

Originally  a  phase  of  didactic  idealism,  we  have  the  famous 
matter  of  the  morals  of  art.  This  problem,  knotty  and  insolv- 
able  enough  by  itself,  was  complicated  by  the  Puritan  attack. 
It  was  also  complicated  by  the  English  suspicion  of  Italian 
vices.^®  Setting  aside,  however,  these  complications  as  ethical 
rather  than  literary  problems,  we  have  in  the  purely  literary 
part  of  the  discussion  the  question,  How  far  can  art  present  evil 
or  make  it  attractive;  or,  in  other  words,  if  the  central  funt-tion 
of  art  is  to  teach  virtue,  how  far  can  it  go  in  exact  imitation  of 
an  un virtuous  world. 

In  the  hands  of  Lodge^®  this  idealistic  moral  purpose  is  a 
satirical  purpose,  and  poetry  is  conceived  as  a  scourge  of  abuses. 
"A  poet's  wnt  can  correct,  yet  not  offend."  Therefore,  he  says 
under  the  protection  of  fiction  what  he  cannot  say  in  direct 
language.*" 

In  Sir  Philip's  Apology  again  we  have  the  moral  popping 
out  with  the  persistence  of  that  in  an  improving  story  for  young 
gentlemen.  The  poet  is  a  better  moral  teacher  than  the  philoso- 
pher, because  more  moving.*^    And  again  :*- 


34.  Miss  Wylie  [p.  41]  points  out  though  that  Dryden  chanRcd  from  his  oriffinsl 
idea  of  instruction  as  the  purpose  of  art  [Preface  to  Trans.  Works,  XII,  279] 
to  that  of  moral  truth  as  the  purpose  [Defense  of  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy].  Cf. 
also  Sir  Richard  Blackmore's  Preface  to  Prince  Arthur  [1695].     Sp.  III.  228. 

35.  [1679].    K.    I,    209. 

36.  Discourse  Concerning  the  Original  and  Progress  of  Satire   [1693].  K.  II,  82. 

37.  Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting    [1695].   K.   II,    128. 

38.  See  Sm.  xviii. 

39.  Defense   of  Poetry    [1579].    Sm.   I,    82. 

40.  This  doctrine  was  later  elaborated  with  the  refinement  of  a  degenerate 
criticism  by   Shaftesbury. 

41.  [1583  95].   Sm.   I,    171.      Cf.   also   p.    180,    186-7. 

42.  lb.  p.  159. 


33  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

''These  tliird  |the  poets  are  the  third  of  three  classes  who  use 
imitation]  be  the}'  whieh  most  properly  do  imitate  to  teaeh  and 
deligrht,  and  to  imitate  borrow  nothing  of  what  i.s,  hath  been,  or 
shall  be :  but  range,  only  reined  with  learned  discretion,  into  the 
divine  consideration  of  what  may  be,  and  should  be.  These  be 
the}'  that,  as  the  first  and  most  noble  sort,  may  justly  be  termed 
rates,  so  these  are  waited  on  in  the  excellentest  languages  and 
best  understandings,  with  the  fore  described  name  of  poets :  for 
these  indeed  do  merely  make  to  imitate,  and  imitate  both  to 
delight  and  teach,  and  delight  to  move  men  to  take  that  good- 
ness in  hand,  which  without  delight  they  would  fly  as  from  a 
stranger;  and  teach,  to  make  them  know  that  goodness  where- 
unto  they  are  moved,  which  being  the  noblest  scope  to  which 
ever  any  learning  was  directed,  yet  want  there  not  idle  tongues 
to  bark  at  them."  Comedy  that  merely  stirs  to  laughter  is  bad. 
It  should  also  teach.*^ 

"The  great  fault  even  in  that  point  of  laughter,  and  for- 
bidden plainly  by  Aristotle,  is  that  they  stir  laughter  in  sinful 
things,  which  are  rather  execrable  than  ridiculous:  or  in  miser- 
able, which  are  rather  to  be  pitied  than  scorned." 

Evil  may,  however,  be  used  as  a  foil  to  goodness:**  "In  the 
actions  of  our  life  who  seeth  not  the  filthiness  of  evil  wanteth  a 
great  foil  to  perceive  the  beauty  of  virtue."  Yet  more,  the 
presentation  of  evil  teaches  us  its  physiogomy  so  that  in  life  we 
may  know  where  to  expect  it.  And  yet  this  is  not  the  only  pur- 
pose, for  as  man  instinctively  hates  the  evil  characters,  he 
comes,  by  the  recognition  of  his  own  traits  to  hate  the  evil  in 
himself.  It  would  be  worth  while  to  quote  here  some  of  that 
splendid  mixture  of  naive  sense  and  Shakespearian  humanity 
always  characteristic  of  Sidney.  But  we  must  stick  to  our 
topic.  In  this  treatment  of  evil  and  good,  we  have  the  culmin- 
ating point  of  didactic  idealism.  The  loftiness  of  its  purpose,  and 
the  purity  of  its  moral  aspiration  command  as  much  admiration  as 
do  the  kindred  qualities  in  Milton,*'  and  are  free  from  the  con- 


43.  lb.  p.   200. 

44.  lb.    p.    177. 

4.").    Note,    liowever,    the   objection   of   Voltaire    that   Milton    did    not    make    his   evil 
spirits  repulsive,  as  in  realitj'  they  would  have  been. 


The  Purpose  of  Literary  Art  39 

troversial  bitterness  whieh  sometimes  disturbed  the  serenity  of 
Milton. 

At  the  same  time  we  cannot  but  carry  away  the  conviction 
that  an  art  built  upon  such  principles  would  appeal  little  to  our 
modem  taste. 

For  example,  Sidney  says:*° 

"If  the  poet  do  his  part  aright,  he  will  show  you  in  Tantalus, 
Atreus,  and  such  like,  nothing  that  is  not  to  be  shunned ;  in 
Cyrus,  -^neas,  Ulysses,  each  thing  to  be  followed ;  when  the  his- 
torian, bound  to  tell  things  as  things  were,  cannot  be  liberal 
(without  being  poetical)  of  a  perfect  pattern,  but,  as  in  Alexan- 
der or  Scipio  himself,  show  doings,  some  to  be  liked,  some  to  be 
misliked."  Almost  needless  to  say  such  "poets"  are  obsolete, 
except  on  the  stage  of  melodrama,  and  we  are  now  all  what 
Sidney  would  call  historians. 

Webbe*^  does  not  go  so  far,  but  yet  considers  that  "In  jesting 
it  must  be  observed  that  it  be  not  lascivious,  or  ribaldlikc,  or 
slanderous;  which  precept  holds  generally  in  all  sorts  of  writ- 
ings." On  the  heels  of  this  comes  Puttenham,*"  who  believing 
that  art  may  be  used  solely  for  recreation,  thinks  it  "may 
allowably  bear  matter  not  always  of  the  gravest  or  of  any  great 
commodity  or  profit,  but  rather  in  some  sort  vain,  dissolute,  or 
wanton,  so  it  is  not  very  scandalous  and  of  evil  example."  Sir 
John  Harrington, ^^  on  the  other  hand,  excuses — tho  somewhat 
grudgingly — looseness  or  scurrility  if  it  is  decorous.  Meres*° 
quotes  from  Plutarch  to  the  effect  that  when  a  poet  puts  evil  into 
his  work,  he  should  always  put  a  condemnation  with  it:  but  im- 
mediately after  proceeds  to  a  dictum,  the  liberality  of  which  is 
most  surprising  for  its  date  :^^ 

"As  we  are  delighted  in  the  picture  of  a  viper  or  a  spider 
artificially  enclosed  within  a  precious  jewel,  so  poets  do  delight 
us  in  the  learned  and  cunning  depainting  of  vices." 

In  the  later  period  Milton^-  is  of  the  opinion  that  the  paths 


46.  Ih.  p.  168. 

47.  I.  c.  Sm.  I,  294. 

48.  I.  c.   Sm.   II,    25. 

49.  [1591].   Sm.   II,   215. 

50.  Palladis  Tamia    [1598].   Sm.    II,    310. 

51.  lb.   Sm.  II,  312. 

52.  Reason    of    ChurchOovemmeixt     Urged    Again»t    Prelaty.       Bk.     II,     [1641]. 
Sp.   I,    197. 


rO  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

of  lionesty  and  a  good  life  are  really  easy  and  pleasant,  though 
tlie^'  do  not  look  so,  and  that  literature  should  reveal  them  as 
the.y  are.  Sir  Wiliain  Davenant,  in  his  Preface  to  Gondibert,^^ 
declares  that  he  chose  a  story  of  Christian  persons  because  it 
more  conduced  to  the  teaching  of  virtue  than  a  story  of  some 
other  religion.  In  the  same  place  he  refers  to  virtue  as  a  beauty. 
Cowley^^  is  more  puritan  in  his  asceticism,  though  he  admits 
"Neither  would  I  here  be  misunderstood,  as  if  I  affected  so 
much  gravity  as  to  be  ashamed  to  be  thought  really  in  love. ' ' 

Shortly  after  this  came  the  views  of  Corneille.  Comedy — he 
follows  Aristotle — is  "La  naive  peinture  des  vices  et  des  ver- 
tues.^'"'  But  he  adheres  to  the  moral  in  his  advocacy  of  a 
didactic  purpose;  and  going  further  concedes  to  popular  taste 
the  reward  of  good  and  the  punishment  of  evil. 

"C'est  cet  interet  qu'on  aime  a  prendre  pour  les  vertueux  qui 
a  oblige  d'en  venir  a  cette  autre  maniere  de  finir  le  poeme 
dramatique  par  la  punition  des  mauvaises  actions  et  la  recom- 
pense des  bonnes,  qui  n'est  pas  un  precepte  de  I'art,  mais  un 
usage  que  nous  avons  embrasse,  dont  chacun  pent  se  departir  a 
ses  perils." 

Moreover  the  drama  must  have  "sentiments,"  and  these  must 
be  virtuous,  or  at  least  healthy  and  correct,  that  is,  must  reflect 
upon  the  topics  in  such  manner  as  will  please  a  healthy  man  and 
will  not  distort  facts.°® 

It  remained  for  Wolseley"^  to  dissociate  art  from  morals.  In 
Rj'mer,'^  a  little  later,  we  have  again  the  moral  idea,  but  this  time 


53.  [1650].  Sp.  II,  9.  Compare  also  Nordau's  explanation  of  the  katharsis  of 
ArixtoHf  [Cf.  also  p.  27.  Note].  Degeneration,  Bk.  Ill,  Ch.  iii.  The  normal  idea  ac- 
cording lo  hi.s  view  is  one  that  is  recognized  as  pleasing  because  it  is  beneficial.  And 
the  pleasing  discharge  of  emotion  is  beneficial:  "Tlic  representation  of  deserved  mis- 
fortune awakens  ideas  of  justice,  a  moral,  agreeable  idea;  and  even  that  of  unmerited 
misfortune  gives  rise  to  pity,  in  itself  a  feeling  of  pain,  though,  in  its  quality  of 
a  racial  instinct,  beneficial  and  therefore  not  only  moral,  but,  in  its  final  essence, 
agreeable." 

54.  Preface  to  Poems   [1656].      Sp.   II,   85. 

55.  Discours  de  I'VtUile  et  des  Parties  du  Poeme  Dramatique  [1660].  As  Ck>r- 
neille's  views  generally  passed  into  England  and  were  freely  discussed  there,  they 
may  be   included   here. 

56.  DiHCOKrs  den  Trois  Unit^x   [1660]. 

57.  Preface  to  Rochester's   Valenfinian  [1685].   Sp.  Ixxxv. 

58.  Short  View  nf  Tragedy  [169.3].  Sp.  II,  252.  Jeremy  Collier  [1698]  objects 
to  The  Ri'lnjine  on  the  same  score  [Sp.  Ill,  277].  Mr.  Spingarn  notes  that  he 
folloAvs   in   the  whole  piece  of  criticism.   Rymer's  method    [III,   336,   Note]. 


The  Purpose  of  Literary  Art  41 

characterized  by  the  sweet  reasonabhjness  of  the  classical  moral 
idea  at  its  best : 

"Rather  may  we  ask  here  what  unnatural  crime  Desdemona 
or  her  parents  had  committed,  to  bring  this  judgment  down 
upon  her:  to  wed  a  blackamoor,  and  innocent  to  be  thus  cruelly 
murdered  by  him.  What  instruction  can  we  make  out  of  this 
catastrophe?  Or  whither  must  our  reflection  lead  us?  Is  not 
this  to  envenom  and  sour  our  spirits,  to  make  us  repine  and 
grumble  at  Providence  and  the  government  of  the  world?  If 
this  be  our  end,  what  boots  it  to  be  virtuous  ? ' ' 

Finally  we  come  to  Dryden's  views  oij  the  moral  question, 
which,  considering  his  own  questionable  morals,  may  be  inter- 
esting. Eugenius,  in  the  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy,^^  says  that 
some  of  the  ancients  erred  by  showing  a  "prosperous  \\ickedne.ss, 
and  an  unhappy  piety."  Elsewhere,  Dryden,  speaking  for  him- 
self, quotes  Bossu^°  to  the  effect  that  the  first  rule  in  writing  an 
heroic  poem  is  to  find  a  moral.    Again  :^^ 

"The  poet  is  bound,  and  that  ex  officio,  to  give  his  reader 
some  one  precept  of  moral  virtue,  and  to  caution  him  against 
some  one  particular  vice  or  folly."  Yet  again  there  should  be 
nothing  immoral,  low,  or  filthy."^  Again,^^  an  heroic  poem  is 
"to  form  the  mind  to  heroic  virtue  by  example";  it  "raises  the 
soul,  and  hardens  it  to  virtue";  it  serves  "to  expel  arrogance, 
and  introduce  compassion."  His  fables  are  chosen  with  refer- 
ence in  each  case  to  the  moral."* 

Plainly  we  have  here,  both  in  Prance  and  in  England,  modem, 
or  at  least  eighteenth  century  notes  of  precise  self-confidence  in 
criticism,  distinctly  different  from  the  still  semi-medieval, 
speculative  Elizabethan  criticism. 

But  not  all  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  century  criticism  was 
imbued  with  moralizing  or  didacticism.  A  whole  literary  society 
engaged  in  regenerating  or  impro\dng  one  another,  by  means  of 
sugar-coated   moral  or  social  lessons,   surreptitiously    adminis- 


59.  [1668].    K.    I,    50. 

60.  Preface  to   TroUus  and  Cressida   [1679].   K.   I,   213;    also   Paiall.-l  of  Poetry 
and  Painting    [1695].   K.  II,    127. 

61.  Dincnursf  Concerning  the  Original  and  Progress  of  Satire  [1693].K.  II,   104. 

62.  Parallel  of  P.  and  P.    [1695].  K.  II,   129. 

63.  Dedication    of   the   J-:neis    [1697].    K.    II,    154. 

64.  Preface  to  the  Fables  [1700].  K.  II,  250. 


42  The  Rise  of  Classical  Eyiglish  Criticis?n 

tered,  is  appallinfr  to  think  of.  But  in  criticism,  no  less  than  in 
the  drama  and  in  the  lyric  poetry,  we  find  the  pure,  joyful  note 
of  pleasure  for  happiness'  sake.  One  of  the  earliest  notes  here 
again  comes  from  Sir  Philip  Sidney.  In  his  Apology,^^  poetry  is 
"an  art  of  imitation,  to  speak  metaphorically,  a  speaking  picture: 
-with  this  end,  to  teach  and  delight."    [The  itailcs  are  mine]. 

Spenser*'^  gives  evidence  of  the  contemporary  demand  for 
pleasure  in  art  as  an  end  in  itself,  but  with  a  puritan  note  of 
regret  that  it  should  be.  But  he  accedes  to  popular  demand,  for 
there  is  "nothing  esteemed  of,  that  is  not  delightful  and  pleas- 
ing to  common  sense,"  that  is  the  vulgar  senses.  DanieP'  also 
coupled  with  one  of  the  purposes  of  poetry,  viz.  convenience  for 
memory,  delight  as  another  such  purpose. 

At  this  point  we  have  again  a  chronological  gap,  and  our 
subject  reopens  after  the  disappearance  of  Puritan  power  and 
the  appearance  of  Corneille  and  Dryden.  Shadwell,*''^  in  1671, 
gives  evidence  of  a  well  recognized  conception  of  pleasure  as  an 
end  of  art  by  recoiling  from  it. 

"I  must  take  leave  to  dissent  from  those  who  seem  to  insinu- 
ate that  the  ultimate  end  of  a  poet  is  to  delight,  without  correc- 
tion or  instruction.  Methinks  a  poet  should  never  acknowledge 
this,  for  it  makes  hira  of  as  little  use  to  mankind  as  a  fiddler  or 
dancing  master,  who  delights  the  fancy  only,  without  improving 
the  judgment."  This  seems  to  be  an  early  reaction  against  the 
doctrine  of  Corneille,""  who  somewhat  inconsistently  accepts  the 
dictum  implied,  rather  than  expressed,  by  Aristotle,  that  pleas- 
ure is  the  sole  end  of  poetry.  Thomas  Hobbes  thinks  that  an 
heroic  poem  should  not  only  profit  but  also  delight.^°  A  little 
later,  though,   we  find  Thomas  Rymer'^  best  known  to  us  as 


65.  [1.583-95].  Rm.  I,  158. 

66.  Letter   to   Raleigh    [1589]. 

67.  A  Dfferme  of  Rhyme   [1603?].   Sm.  II,   359. 

68.  Preface  to  The  Huviorvits  [1671].  Sp.  II,  153. 

69.  DwcouTH  de  I'UtUiti  et  des  Parties  du  Poeme  Dramatique   [1660]. 

Four  years  before  this,  Cowley  [Preface  to  poems,  1656.  Sp.  I,  Ixxv,  and  II, 
81.]  had  boldly  asserted  that  to  communicate  delight  to  others  is  the  main  end  of 
poetry.  Hut  the  statement  occurs,  casually,  in  a  subordinate  clause,  and  should  not 
be  given  much  weight,  not  even  so  much  as  Mr.  Spingarn  appears  to  give  it. 

70.  Preface  to  his  translation  of  the  Odyssey.  To  the  Reader  Concerning  the 
Virtuen  of  an   Heroic  Poem    [1675[.   Sp.  II,   67. 

71.  TrnnedicK  of  the  Last  Aye  Considered  and  Examined  by  the  Practice  of  the 
Ancients  and  by  the  Common  Sense  of  All  Ayes  [1678].  Sp.  II,  206. 


77/^  Ptirpose  of  Literary  Art  43 

author  of  the  famous  attack  upon  Shakespeare's  art,  coming;  out, 
with  characteristic  boldness,  in  favor  of  a  frankly  ph'asure  loving 
poetry.  But  even  here  there  is  still  the  older  English  note  of 
"profit."  There  is  more  sugar  coating  than  i)ill  in  Kyiiier's 
almost  de-moral-ized  art:  but  the  pill  is  still  there.  He  puts 
numbers  to  his  credo,  to  be  specific : 

"1.     I  believe  the  end  of  all  poetry  is  to  please. 

2.  Some  sorts  of  poetry  please  without  profitinfr. 

3.  I  am  confident  whoever  writes  a  tragedy  cannot  [only?] 
please  but  must  also  profit;  'tis  the  physic  of  the  mind  that  he 
makes  palatable. ' ' 

Dryden  also  believes  in  delight^^  as  one  of  the  primary  ends 
of  art ;  though  a  reference  to  his  already  quoted  advocacy  of  the 
teaching  and  moral  purpose  will  show  that  it  was  not,  in  his 
conception,  the  only  one.  Leading  to  the  same  end  is  the  idea 
that  the  arousing  of  admiration  is  an  end  of  art,"  though  here 
we  may  have  also  an  element  of  idealism. 

Closely  akin  to  these  views  of  the  pleasure  giving  of  art, 
though  arising  from  an  antithetical  strain  of  pessimism,  is  the 
conception  of  art  as  a  solace  for  the  ills  of  life,  a  characterization 
of  literature  that  recalls  Huxley's  characterization  of  some  sorta 
of  theology  as  an  anesthetic  against  the  woes  of  the  world.  Tina 
idea  occurs  in  the  work  of  Puttenham.^^  Puttenham  was  too 
jovial  a  man,  however,  to  have  taken  this  doctrine  in  any  genu- 
inely pessimistic  way.  Later  the  same  view  is  echoed  by 
Bacon.'' 

We  may  safely  say,  therefore,  despite  the  scantiness  of  evi- 
dence, that  in  the  period  which  we  have  under  consideration  the 
conception  of  moral,  social,  or  political  truth  masquerading  as 
art  gradually  disintegrated,  while  the  conception  of  art  for  the 
sake  of  the  spontaneous  joy  of  it  grew.     Of  the  higher  ethical 


72.  Author's  Apology  for  Heroic  Poetry  and  Poetic  Science  [1677].  K.  I.  179 
Discourse  Concerning  the  Original  and  Progress  of  Satire  [lti9:i].  K.  II,  66,  81. 
A   Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting   [1695].  K.    11,    13. 

73.  Dedication  of  Examen  Poeticum  [1693].  K.  II.  12.  .\lso  Parallel  of  P. 
and  P.   [1695].  K.  II,  138,  where  he  speaks  of  the  pleasure  flowing  from  admiration. 

74.  [1589].    Sm.    II,   25    and   33. 

75.  Advancement  of  Learning  II,  iv.  [1605].  See  Saintsbury,  Hiat.  of  Crit. 
II,    194. 


44  The  Rise  of  Classical  Etiglish  Criticism 

seriousness  which  converts  joy  into  a  species  of  worship  and 
fornuihites  the  phrase  Vart  pour  I'art  we  find  practically  none. 

Side  b3'  side  with  the  doctrines  we  have  been  considering  we 
find  at  least  two  others  which  are  at  the  same  time  clear  enough 
and  sufficiently  prevalent  in  their  own  day  to  be  considered  in 
some  sort  canons  of  contemporary  art.  One  is  the  very  curious 
doctrine  that  poetry  takes  its  form  for  the  sake  of  aiding  memory. 
With  savages  and  the  earliest  literary  audiences  poetry  seems 
chronologically  to  have  preceded  prose.  And  this  may  perhaps 
be  explained  in  part  by  the  superiority  of  verse  for  memorizing. 
But  it  is  a  little  strange  to  find  such  a  doctrine  reappearing  in 
the  days  of  Elizabeth. 

Here  again  the  first  appearance  of  the  doctrine  in  English 
seems  to  be  in  the  treatise  of  Sidney,^®  who  maintains  that  verse 
exceeds  prose  for  mnemonic  purposes,  since  if  a  word  be  omitted 
in  verse,  the  whole  texture  is  destroyed  and  attention  is  called 
to  the  omission ;  besides  which  one  word  so  leads  to  another  in 
poetry  that  a  man  can  make  a  confident  guess  of  what  is  to  fol- 
low. This  is  plainly  proved,  according  to  Sir  Philip,  by  the  fact 
that  verses  of  Latin  memorized  in  youth  are  still  remembered  in 
old  age,  and  by  the  further  fact  that  those  rules  of  grammar, 
logic,  mathematics,  physics  and  the  rest,  wliich  are  especially  to 
be  remembered  are  put  into  verses.  This  view  is  echoed  by  Sir 
John  Ilarington^^  and  by  Daniel.^* 

The  other  of  these  doctrines,  by  which  earlier  English  critics 
have  attempted  to  explain  why  men  should  write  poetry  is  some- 
what more  vague.  In  fact  it  has  remained  vague  after  the 
passage  of  two  centuries.  The  theory  is  that  poetry  is  written  for 
the  purpose  of  civilizing  men.  Apparently  the  earliest  specific 
note  of  this  idea  is  in  Wilson's  treatise  on  rhetoric.''''' 

"And  therefore  whereas  men  lived  brutishly  in  open  fields 
having  neither  house  to  shroud  [cover]  them  in,  nor  attire  to 
clothe  their  backs;  nor  yet  any  regard  to  seek  their  best  avail 
[interest]  :  these  appointed  of  God,  called  them  together  by  ut- 


76.  [1583-95].    Sm.    I,    183. 

77.  [1591].  Sm.  II,  206. 

78.  [1603?].  Sm.  II,  359.  Cf.  at  this  point,  the  theory  attributed  by  Spingarn 
to  Castelvetro  [Lit.  Crit.,  in  the  Renaimianee,  p.  72]  :  "Verse  is  added  [to  a  play] 
not  merely  as  a  delightful  aocorapaniment,  but  also  in  order  that  the  actors  may 
raise  their  voices  without  inconvenience  and  without  loss  of  dignity."  Cf.  also 
Sir  Richard  Klackmore's  Preface  to  Prince  Arthur  1695.      [Sp.  Ill,  236]. 

79.  /.   c.    [1551?      Earliest  known   ed.    1553]. 


The  Purpose  of  Literary  Art  45 

terance  of  speech;  and  persuaded  with  them  what  was  good, 
what  was  bad,  and  what  was  gainful  for  mankind.  And  although 
at  first  the  rude  could  hardly  learn,  and  either  for  the  strange- 
ness of  the  thing  would  not  gladly  receive  the  offer,  or  else  for 
lack  of  knowledge  could  not  perceive  the  goodness:  yet  being 
somewhat  drawTi  and  delighted  with  the  pleasantness  of  reason 
and  the  sweetness  of  utterance,  after  a  certain  space,  they  be- 
came through  nature  and  good  advisement,  of  wild,  sober;  of 
cruel,  gentle;  of  fools,  wise;  and  of  beasts,  men.  Such  force 
hath  the  tongue,  and  such  is  the  power  of  eloquence  and  reason 
that  most  men  are  forced,  even  to  yield  in  that  which  most  stand- 
eth  against  their  will." 

The  idea  occurs  again  in  Harington's  5ne/  Apology  for  Poetry.^° 
About  the  most  gracefully  worded  expression  of  it,  though,  is 
from  Dryden  :^^ 

"In  a  word,  he  [Horace]  labors  to  render  us  happy  in  rela- 
tion to  ourselves ;  agreeable  and  faithful  to  our  friends ;  and  dis- 
creet, serviceable,  and  well-bred,  in  relation  to  those  with  whom 
we  are  obliged  to  live,  and  to  converse." 

Of  the  purpose  which  to  us  of  to-day  seems  supreme  in  the 
writing  of  poetry  there  is  only  casual  mention.  It  is  refreshing, 
however,  to  run  across  it,  especially  in  the  charming  words  of 
Ilarington.  It  is  the  idea  that  the  chief  end  of  poetry  may  be 
simply  a  making  pleasant  of  the  dull  or  a  revealing  of  beauty  in 
the  ugly  or  the  indifferent.  To  Harington®-  one  of  the  chief 
purposes  of  verse  is  "the  pleasure  and  sweetness  to  the  ear  which 
makes  the  discourse  pleasant  unto  us  often  time  when  the  matter 
itself  is  harsh  and  unacceptable."  "For  my  own  part,"  he  con- 
tinues, "I  was  never  yet  so  good  a  husbandman  to  take  any  de- 
light to  hear  one  of  my  ploughmen  tell  how  an  acre  of  wheat 
must  be  fallowed  and  tvvyfallowed,  and  how  cold  land  should  be 
burned,  and  how  fruitful  land  must  be  well  harrowed ;  but  when 
I  hear  one  read  Virgil,  where  he  saith, 

Saepe  etiam  steriles  incendere  profuit  agros. 


80.  [1591].   Sm.   II,    197. 

81.  Discourse  Concerning  the  Original  and  Progress  of  Satire   [1693],  K.   II,   98. 

82.  [1591].  Sm.  II,  206.  Dryden  has  a  similar  passage,  probably  imitated,  with 
a  suitable  quotation  from  the  fourth  Georgic.  Discourse  Concerning  the  Originai 
and  Progress  of  Satire   [1693].  K.  II,   107. 


46  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

Atque  levem  stipulam  erepitantibns  urere  flammis. 

Sive  inde  oecultas  vires  et  pabula  terra^ 

Pinguia  eoneipiunt :  sive  illis  omiie  per  ignera 

ExecKiuitur  vitiiim,  atque  exsudat  inutilis  humor,  etc., 
and  after, 

]\Iultuin  adeo,  rastris  glebas  qui  frangit  inertes, 

Vimineasque  trahit  crates  juvat  arva. 
with  many  other  lessons  of  homely  husbandry,  but  delivered  in 
so  good  verse  that  methinks  all  that  while  I  could  find  in  my 
heart  to  drive  the  plough." 

This  was  truly  the  doctrine  by  which  Shakespeare  and  his 
contemporaries  lived,  though  they  had  not  the  self-conscious 
science  to  express  it. 


CHAPTER  m : 
TYPES  OF  LITERATURE 


Of  all  subjects  connected  with  the  matter  of  the  types'  of 
art,  that  most  discussed  in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centu- 
ries was  the  sphere  of  tragedy  or  heroic  drama,  the  sphere  of 
comedy  and  the  possibility  of  mixing  the  two  forms.  The  whole 
story  originated  with  Aristotle,  for  whom  the  subject  matter  of 
tragedy  must  be  noble,  while  the  inferior  and  ugly  supplied 
material  for  comedy  and  satire.^  As  early  as  the  time  of  Gas- 
coigne^  we  have  a  preliminary  rumble  of  the  English  contro- 
versy: "To  intermingle  merry  jests  in  a  serious  matter  is  an 
indecorum."  E.  K.,*  who  praises  Spenser,  believes  in  the  force 
of  contrasts,  or  foils : 

"Oftentimes  a  discord  in  music  makes  a  comely  concordance: 
so  great  delight  took  the  worthy  poet  Alceus  to  behold  a  blemish 
in  the  joint  of  a  well  shaped  body." 

As  did  most  doctrines,  so  did  this  become  more  definitive 
in  the  hands  of  Sidney.  He  starts,  however,  with  a  very  erratic 
bit  of  logic,  concerning  the  mingling  of  tragedy  and  comedy, 
prose  and  verse,  and  heroic  and  pastoral  matter:  "If  severed 
they  be  good,  the  conjunction  cannot  be  hurtful."''  Such  mix- 
ture is,  however,  to  be  made  with  decency  and  discretion,  so  as 
not  to  produce  mongrel  tragi-comedy.*^  The  ancients,  he  says,  never 
matched  hornpipes  with  funerals,  or  at  least  did  it  "very  dain- 
tily." The  real  secret,  though,  lies  in  the  fact  that  there  are  two 
sorts  of  comedy;  one  inspires  delight,  the  other  laughter.  The 
former  may  possibly  be  mixed  with  tragedy.     But  the  English. 


1.  In  this  chapter,  discussion,  such  as  that  of  King  James  [Short  Trfatiie 
on  Verne']  concerning  what  special  forms  of  meter  and  strophe  are  suitable  for 
special  subjects,  is  for  the  most  part  passed  over,  the  discarded  dogmas  being  oither 
obvious  or  of  no  real  significance. 

2.  Poetics.      See  Bosanquet,  .Esthetic,  64. 

3.  Certain  Notes  of  Instruction  Concerning  the  Making  of  Terse  or  Rhi/mt 
in  English    [1575]     Sm.  I,   48. 

4.  Letter  to   Harvey    [1579].    Sm.    I,    129. 

5.  Apology   [1583-95].   Sm.   I,    175. 

6.  lb.   199. 

-47- 


•58  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

he  thinks,  have  none  of  this  sort,  but  only  the  comedy  that  in- 
spires hiughter;  hence  their  tragi-cornedies  are  spurious. 

"Our  comedians  think  there  is  no  delight  ^\^thout  laughter; 
which  is  very  wrong,  for  though  laughter  may  come  with  delight ; 
yet  comes  it  not  of  delight,  as  though  delight  should  be  the  cause 
of  laughter:  but  well  may  one  thing  breed  both  together:  nay, 
rather  in  themselves  they  have,  as  it  were,  a  kind  of  contrariety : 
for  delight  we  scarcely  do  but  in  things  that  have  a  convenience 
to  ourselves  or  to  the  general  nature :  laughter  almost  ever  comes 
of  things  most  disproportioned  to  ourselves  and  nature.  Delight 
has  a  joy  in  it,  either  permanent  or  present.  Laughter  has  only 
a  scornful  tickling.''  For  example,  we  are  ravished  with  delight 
to  see  a  fair  woman,  and  yet  are  far  from  being  moved  to  laugh- 
ter. We  laugh  at  deformed  creatures  wherein  certainly  we 
cannot  delight." 

Elsewhere  in  England  this  doctrine  seems  to  have  been  little 
discussed.  But  Shakespeare  was,  at  the  very  time,  mixing 
tragedy  with  almost  burlesque  comedy,  and  Ben  Jonson  was 
saying,  a  little  after,  that  Shakespeare  lacked  art.  In  Sir  Robert 
Howard  we  have  a  man  who  commands  special  attention  in  that 
he  is  himself  a  playwright.  He  plainly  believes^  that  "It  is  most 
proper  to  keep  the  audience  in  one  entire  disposition  both  of  con- 
cern and  attention;  for  when  scenes  of  so  different  natures  im- 
mediately succeed  one  another,  it  is  probable  the  audience  may 
not  so  suddenly  recollect  themselves  as  to  start  into  an  enjoyment 
of  the  mirth  or  into  a  concern  for  the  sadness."  Edward  Phil- 
lips'' likewise  follows  conventionality,  and  condemns  the  mixture 
of  comedy  and  tragedy. 

Dryden  is  at  once  more  dogmatic  and  more  clear.  Lisideius 
says  :^° 

"There  is  no  theater  in  the  world  has  anything  so  absurd  as 
the  English  tragi-comedy ;  'tis  a  drama  of  our  own  invention, 
and  the  fashion  of  it  is  enough  to  proclaim  it  so;  here  a  course  of 
mirth,  there  another  of  sadness  and  passion,  a  third  of  honor, 


7.  C'/.  Chesterfield's  condemnation  of  open  laughter  as  "low." 

8.  Preface  to  Four  New  Plays  [1665].  Sp.  II,  100. 

9.  I.  c.   [167.5].  Sp.  II,  270. 

10.  Eumtii  of  Dram.  P.    [1668].   K.   I,   57.      Cj.  also  expressions  immediately  fol- 
lowing each   of   these. 


Types  of  Liter  a  hire  49 

and  fourth  a  duel :  thus,  in  two  liours  and  a  half,  we  run 
through  all  the  fits  of  Bedlam."  But  Neander  [Dryden]  re- 
plies :" 

"Why  should  he  imagine  the  soul  of  man  more  heavy  than 
his  senses?  Does  not  the  eye  pass  from  an  unpleasant  ohject  to 
a  pleasant  in  a  much  shorter  time  than  is  required  to  this?  And 
does  not  the  unpleasantness  of  the  first  commend  the  beauty  of 
the  latter?" 

Later,  however,  in  the  Preface  to  Troilus  and  Cressida,*'^^ 
Dryden  says  "He  who  treats  of  joy  and  grief  together  is  in  a 
fair  way  of  causing  neither  of  those  effects. ' ' 

Still  later  we  find  tragi-comedy  characterized  as  "wholly 
Gothic.  "^3 

Passing  now  from  the  subject  of  mixed  tragedy  and  comedy, 
we  come  to  specific  points  of  difference  between  these  types. 
Here  our  chronology  may  start  with  Corneille.  Though  there  is 
much  discussion  of  the  types  at  an  earlier  time,  the  definitions 
of  tragedy  and  comedy  are  mere  repetitions  of  classical  dicta. ^* 
Corneille  follows  Aristotle^^  in  his  definitions,  but  with  a  quali- 
fication. Tragedy  is,  as  Aristotle  said  it  was,  something  that 
deals  with  large  affairs,  and  is  raised  above  smaller  emotions. 
Tragedy  kings  should  not  appear  unless  royally.  They  cannot 
even  fall  in  love  unless  it  be  at  the  peril  of  life  or  state.  Their 
dignity  demands  more  than  mere  love.  It  demands  revenge,  am- 
bition or  the  like.  Comedy  is  concerned  with  the  imitation  of 
base  persons  and  imposters.^"  To  these  two  tj'pes  of  play,  Cor- 
neille adds  a  third,  heroic  comedy,  in  which  a  king  may  fall  in 
love  without  involving  tragic  motives,  yet  without  derogation  to 
his  dignity.     This  heroic  comedy  appears  to  be  identical  with 


11.  76.  69. 

12.  [1679].  K.  I,  223. 

13.  A   Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Paintinff   [1695].  K.   II,    146. 

14.  Cf.  however,  Sidney's  clear  statement  [1583-95.  Sm.  I,  176.]  that  comedy, 
being  an  imitation  of  common  errors,  handles  private  and  domestic  matters,  so  as 
to  familiarize  us  with  petty  arts  and  petty  persons  and  so  warn  lis  against  them. 
Cf.  al.so  the  distinction  of  Sidney,  already  quoted,  between  high  comedy  and  low 
comedy. 

15.  Diseoura  dea  Troia  Vnitia   [1660]. 

16.  Cf.  Fielding,  on  this  subject,  in  his  preface  to  Joseph  Andrru-a.  Comedy,  in 
the  original  conception,  seems  to  have  been  always  slightly  satirical,  and  like  satire 
so  designed  as  to  correct  faults  or  follies. 


50  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

Sidney's  liighor  comedy,  though  the  invention,  by  Corneille,  was 
probably  independent. 

In  the  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy^'  [Neander-Dryden-speak- 
ing]  we  have  a  definition  of  English  comedy  as  distinguished 
from  the  ancient.  In  Aristophanes  the  laugh  arose  not  from 
imitation  but  from  some  "odd  conceit"  that  contained  some 
"unnatural  or  obscene"  feature.  In  English  comedy,  "By 
humor^^  is  meant  some  extravagant  habit,  passion,  or  affection, 
particular  (as  I  said  before)  to  some  one  person,  by  the  oddness 
of  which,  he  is  immediately  distinguished  from  the  rest  of  men; 
which  being  lively  and  naturally  represented,  most  frequently 
begets  that  malicious  pleasure  in  the  audience  which  is  testified 
by  laughter;  as  all  things  which  are  deviations  from  common 
customs  are  ever  the  aptest  to  produce  it :  though  by  the  way  this 
laughter  is  only  accidental,  as  the  person  represented  is  fantastic 
or  bizarre;  but  pleasure  is  essential  to  it,  as  the  imitation  of 
what  is  natural." 

Later^^  in  the  same  essay,  Neander  speaks  of  comedy  as  the 
"imitation  of  common  persons  and  ordinary  speaking"  Comedy, 
however,  should  not  treat  such  matters  heavily,  for,^° 

"The  persons  in  comedy  are  of  a  lower  quality,  the  action  is 
little,  and  the  faults  and  vices  are  but  the  sallies  of  youth,  and 
the  frailties  of  human  nature,  and  not  premeditated  crimes: 
such  to  which  all  men  are  obnoxious,  not  such  as  are  attempted 
only  by  few,  and  those  abandoned  to  all  sense  of  virtue :  such  as 
move  pity  and  commiseration,  not  detestation  and  horror:  such, 
in  sliort,  as  may  be  forgiven,  not  such  as  must  of  necessity  be 
punished." 

Comedy  is  not  merely  the  pleasant  part  of  life :  it  is  at  the 
same  time  the  low.^^  Yet  comedy  is  not  the  lowest  type;  for 
lower  still  is  the  farce,^^  in  which  persons  and  actions  are  un- 
natural and  the  manner  false.  Farce  consists  of  forced  humor 
and  unnatural  events,  monstrous  and  chimerical,  and  Dryden 


17.  [1C68].    K.    I,    85. 

18.  Jonson's  "humor."     Cf.  also  Congreve,  Concerning  Humor  in  Comedy  [1695]. 
Sp.   Ill,   242,  el  seq. 

19.  lb.    100. 

20.  Preface  to  An  Evening'8  Love,  or  the  Mock  Astrologer    [1671].   K.   I,    143. 
See  also  Preface  to  Troilus  and  Cressida   [1679].   K.   I,   209. 

21.  A  Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting  [1695].  K.  II,  132. 

22.  lb. 


Types  of  L  it  era  ture  51 

does  not  like  it.-^  Comedy  appeals  to  good  judges  of  men  and 
manners,  farce  to  those  who  are  judges  of  neither  and  can  only 
appreciate  extravagance.  But  whatever  comedy  be,  the  mere 
element  of  laughter  does  nothing  to  elevate  it.  For  laughter, 
thinks  Dryden,  is  one  of  the  most  animal  of  human  habits.-* 

More  beautiful  than  comedy  is  tragedy,  chiefly  because  the 
persons  are  greater  and  the  actions  both  greater  and  nobler, 
hence  productive  of  more  benefit  and  greater  and  more  noble 
pleasure.-^ 

It  remains  now  to  take  a  look  at  certain  views  on  the  historical 
drama,  a  subject  of  some  special  interest  to-day  on  account  of  its 
later  offspring-problem,  historical  realism  in  the  drama.  A 
foreshadowing  of  this  historical  realism  we  have  in  Stirling  :^^ 

"It  is  more  agreeable  with  the  gravity  of  a  tragedy  that  it  be 
grounded  upon  a  true  history,  where  the  greatness  of  a  known 
person,  urging  regard,  doth  work  the  more  powerfully  upon  the 
affections.  As  for  the  satirist  and  epigrammatist,  they  mix 
both  the  two,  who  shadowing  truth  with  fables,  and  discovering 
true  persons  with  feigned  names,  may,  by  alluding  to  antiquity, 
tax  the  modern  times." 

Davenant,-^  whose  views  on  epic  poetry  apply  with  equal 
force  to  the  drama,  believes  in  historical  subjects,  because  men 
will  love  the  renowTi  of  a  virtuous  predecessor  when  they  will  not 
reverence  the  glory  of  a  contemporary  who  overshadows  them, 
but  will  rather  envy  him  as  merely  favored  of  fortune. 

Later  we  find  discussion  of  the  type  heroic  poem  in  Dryden 's 
Essay  of  Heroic  Flays?^  The  heroic  poem  has  love  and  valor 
for  its  subjects.    At  the  same  time-^ 

"An  heroic  poet  is  not  tied  to  a  bare  representation  of  what  is 
true,  or  exceeding  probable ;  but  that  he  may  let  himself  loose  to 
visionary  objects,  and  to  the  representation  of  such  things  as 


23.  Bobertag,   I.    c.    392.      See   also   Dryden's   An   Evening's   Love,   or   the   Mock 
Astrologer  [1671].  K.  I.  136. 

24.  A  Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting  [1695].  K.  II,  133. 

25.  I.  c.   136.    Cf.  also  the  Defense  of  an  Essay  of  Dram.  P.   [1668].  K.  I,   120: 
Admiration  is  the  delight  of  tragedy,  satire  of  comedy. 

26.  Anacrisis  [1634?].  Sp.  I,  186. 

27.  I.  c.  Sp.  II,  11. 

28.  [1672].   K.  I,    150. 

29.  lb.    153. 


52  The  Rise  of  Classical  Ryiglish  Criticism 

depending  not  on  sense  and  therefore  not  to  be  comprehended  by 
knowledge,    may    give    him    a    freer    scope    for    imagination." 

''Again  :^« 

' '  The  epic  poem  is  more  for  the  manners,  and  tragedy  for  the 
passions."  Sir  Ricliard  Bhickmore^^  adds  that  the  formal  object 
of  an  epic  is  admiration,  and  the  fact  that  it  admits  nothing  that 
is  not  admirable  distinguishes  it  from  all  other  types  of  poetry. 

Dryden's  conception  of  the  satiric  poem  is  also  important,^^ 
though  his  definition  of  the  type  is  quoted  from  Casaubon  -P 

"The  satiric  is  a  dramatic  poem,  annexed  to  a  tragedy,  hav- 
ing a  chorus,  which  consists  of  satyrs.  The  persons  represented 
in  it  are  illustrious  men;  the  action  of  it  is  great;  the  style  is 
parth'  serious,  and  partly  jocular;  and  the  event  of  the  action 
most  commonly  is  happy." 

Turning  to  the  lesser  types  of  poetry,  we  find,  in  literature 
in  general,  allegory  approved  by  Bacon^*  as  a  concession  to  primi- 
tive instincts  in  men  v^^ho  have  not  risen  to  a  scientific  level. 
]\Iilton^^  also  has  his  crochet,  religious  verse.  The  songs  of  the 
scriptures  he  calls  the  finest  kinds  of  lyric,  "not  in  their  divine 
argument  alone,  but  in  the  very  critical  art  of  composition." 
Poetry  of  such  sort  is,  according  to  him,  useful  for  philosophy, 
for  worship,  for  didactic  purposes,  for  exposition,  in  fact  for 
most  of  the  functions  of  serious  literature  except  those  of  the 
drama  and  narratives. 

If  we  supplement  these  views  with  the  remarks  of  Sir  Philip 
Sidney  on  the  types  the  story  and  the  treatise,^^  we  have  practi- 
cally a  review  of  the  whole  matter  of  the  types  of  art  as  con- 
ceived in  the  period  we  are  considering.  Puttenham  's^^  classifi- 
cations of  the  forms  of  poetry,  like  other  allusions  to  the  subject, 
are  merely  conventional  explanations  of  ancient  or  renaissance 
forms  of  verse.  The  groupings  of  Puttenham  may,  however,  be 
noted.  For  while  his  names  of  poetic  types  are  largely  peda- 
gogical, his  grouping  of  the  types  with  reference  to  the  emotions 


30.  Dryden,    Dedication   of   the   Aeneis    [1697].    K.    II,    160. 

31.  Preface  to  Prince  Arthur  [1695].  Sp.   Ill,  239. 

32.  A   Discourse  Concerning  the  Original  and  Progress  of  Satire   [1693].  K.  II. 

33.  I.   c.   51. 

34.  Advancement   'of    Learnini/.       Bk.     II     [1605].    Sp.     I,     7.       Cf.    p.    35,    I.    c. 

35.  I.   c.   Sp.   I,    197. 

36.  p.  70. 

37.  I.   c. 


Types  of  Literature  53 

has  considerable  fresliness.     These  f,'r()U[)inf^s  can  be  seen  most 
readily  in  a  recapitulation  of  his  chapter  heading's: 

Chap.  XII,  In  What  Form  of  Poesy  the  Gods  of  tne  Gentiles 
were  Praised  and  Honored;  XIII,  In  What  Form  of  Poesy 
Vice  and  the  Common  Abuses  of  Man's  Life  was  [sic]  Repre- 
hended ;  XIV,  How  Vice  was  Afterward  Reproved  by  Two  Other 
Manner  of  Poems,  Better  Reformed  Than  the  Satire,  Whereof  the 
First  was  Comedy,  the  Second  Tragedy;  XV,  In  What  Form  of 
Poesy  the  Evil  and  Outrageous  Behaviours  of  Princes  were  Rep- 
rehended; XVI,  In  What  Form  of  Poesy  the  Great  Princes  and 
Dominators  of  the  World  were  Honored;  XVII,  Of  the  Places 
Where  their  Interludes  or  Poems  Dramatic  were  Represented  to 
the  People;  XVIII,  Of  the  Shepherd's  or  Pastoral  Poesy  Called 
Eclogue  and  to  What  Purpose  it  was  First  Invented  And  Used ; 
XIX,  Of  Historical  Poesy,  by  Which  the  Famous  Acts  of  Princes 
and  the  Virtuous  and  Worthy  Lives  of  Our  Forefathers  were  Re- 
ported; XX,  In  What  Form  of  Poesy  Virtue  in  the  Inferior 
Sort  was  Commended;  XXI,  The  Form  Wlierein  Honest  and 
Profitable  Arts  and  Sciences  were  Treated;  XXII,  In  What 
Form  of  Poesy  the  Amorous  Affections  and  Allurements  were 
Uttered;  XXIII,  The  Form  of  Poetical  Rejoicings;  XXIV,  The 
Form  of  Poetical  Lamentations;  XXV,  Of  the  Solemn  Rejoic- 
ings at  the  Nativity  of  Princes'  Children;  XXVI,  The  Manner 
of  Rejoicings  at  Marriages  and  Weddings;  XXVII,  The  I\Ianner 
of  Poesy  by  Which  they  Uttered  their  Bitter  Taunts,  and  Privy 
Nips  or  Witty  Scoffs,  and  Other  Merry  Conceits;  XXVIII,  Of 
the  Poem  Called  Epitaph  Used  for  Memorial  of  the  Dead; 
XXIX,  A  Certain  Ancient  Form  of  Poesy  by  Which  Men  Did 
Use  to  Reproach  their  Enemies;  XXX,  Of  Short  Epigrams 
Called  Posies. 


CHAPTER  IV: 
MATERIALS  SUITABLE  FOR  LITERATURE 


At  the  outset  of  the  discussion  of  what  materials  are  suitable 
for  art  we  find  note  of  at  least  one  sort  considered  unsuitable. 
King  Jaraes^  tells  us  that  the  poet  should  not  meddle  with  mat- 
ters of  the  common  weal  or  such  grave  matters. 

"Webbe,  in  his  catalogue  of  dogmas  from  Horace,  repeats  some 
ideas  concerning  the  legitimate  function  of  imitation,  and  the 
consequent  validity  of  imitative  material  as  suitable  for  the  uses 
of  a  Mriter.  Ascham,'  before  this,  had  frankly  urged  imitation 
upon  all  Elizabethans,  but  Ascham's  views  are  rather  peda- 
gogical than  critical  in  our  sense,  and  his  imitation  is  urged  as  a 
pedagogic  expedient.  Webbe^  deals  more  directly  with  critical 
canons.  Though  he  is  quoting,  the  fact  that  his  quotation  is  re- 
produced in  a  standard  treatise  on  rhetoric  is  sufficient  to  stamp 
it  as  one  of  the  adopted  English  canons  of  his  day : 

"Matters  which  are  common  may  be  handled  by  a  poet  as 
they  be  thought  proper  to  himself  alone.  All  matters  of  them- 
selves are  open  to  be  treated  of  by  any  man ;  but  if  a  thing  be 
handled  of  some  one  in  such  sort  as  he  hereby  obtain  great  praise, 
he  makes  it  his  own  or  proper  to  himself;  as  many  did  write  of 
the  Trojan  war,  but  yet  Homer  made  matter  which  was  common 
to  all  proper  to  himself."  This  defense  of  borrowed  material  in 
art  finds  an  echo  in  Dryden.* 

At  the  same  time  there  is,  according  to  Webbe,  to  be  some 
selection.  For  the  poet  should  not  try  any  subject  that  is  not 
personally  agreeable.^ 

But  material  for  art  should  also  have  novelty.  Says  Cas- 
coigne :® 

"If  I  should  undertake  to  write  in  praise  of  a  gentlewoman, 


1.  Treatise  on  Verse   [1584].   Sm.  I,  221. 

2.  The  Schoolmaster  [1570].  Sm.  I,  1. 

3.  I.   c.    [1586].   Sm.    I,   292. 

4.  Bohn,   I.   c. 

5.  /.  c.  296. 

6.  Notes  or   Terse-Making  [1575].  Sm.  I,  48. 

—54— 


Materials  Suitable  for  Literature  55 

I  would  neither  praise  lier  chrystal  eye,  nor  lier  cherry  lip,  etc. 
For  these  things  are  triia  ct  ohvia.  But  I  would  either  find  some 
supernatural  cause  whereby  my  pen  might  walk  in  the  superla- 
tive degree,  or  else  I  would  undertake  to  answer  for  any  imper- 
fection that  she  has,  and  thereupon  raise  the  praise  of  her  com- 
mendation. Likewise,  if  I  should  disclose  my  pretence  in  love, 
I  would  either  make  a  strange  discourse  of  some  intolerable  pas- 
sion, or  find  occasion  to  plead  by  the  example  of  some  history, 
or  discover  my  disquiet  in  shadows  per  allegoriam,  or  use  the 
covertest  means  that  I  could  to  avoid  the  uncomely  customs  of 
common  writers." 

James  of  Scotland^  has  much  the  same  idea,  which — trite 
though  it  be — is  worth  recording. 

"You  must  also  beware  of  composing  anything  in  the  same 
manner  as  has  been  over  oft  used  before.  As  in  special,  if  you 
speak  of  love,  beware  you  describe  your  love's  companionableness, 
or  her  fairness.  And  similarly  that  you  describe  not  the  morning 
and  rising  of  the  sun  in  the  preface  of  your  verse,  for  these 
things  are  so  often  and  diversely  written  upon  by  poets  already, 
that  if  you  do  the  like  it  will  appear  you  but  imitate,  and  that 
it  comes  not  of  your  own  invention,  which  is  one  of  the  chief 
properties  of  a  poet.  Therefore,  if  your  subject  be  to  praise 
your  love,  you  shall  rather  praise  her  other  qualities,  not  her 
fairness  or  her  shape ;  or  else  you  shall  speak  some  little  thing 
of  it,  and  afterwards  say  that  your  wits  are  so  small,  and  your 
utterance  so  barren,  that  you  cannot  describe  any  part  of  her 
w'orthily ;  remitting  always  to  the  reader  to  judge  of  her.  in  re- 
spect she  matches,  or  rather  excels,  Venus,  or  any  woman  to 
whom  it  shall  please  you  to  compare  her." 

The  ubi(iuitous  and  rather  painfully  omniscient  Webbe^  also 
has  words  to  the  same  effect.  Ben  Jonson»  also,  as  might  be  in- 
ferred from  his  own  style,  objects  to  bookish  mannerisms. 
Hobbes^"  is  only  in  a  very  qualified  way  to  be  quoted  as  a  literary' 
critic;  but  it  may  be  worth  wiiile,  in  passing,  to  notice  his  adher- 
ence to  the  same  canon. 


7.  A.    Short   Treatise   Containing   Sams   Rules   and   Deiicrs   (•    be    Obterved    and 
Eschewed  in  Scotch  Poeny   [1584].   Sm.  I.  220. 

8.  I.  c.  298.   299. 

9.  [1619].   Saintsbury   II,   200. 

10   Answer  to  Davenants  rrefaco  to  Gondibert    [1650].   Sp.   II,   65. 


56  The  Rise  of  Classical  Etiglisk  Ctiticism 

Tlie  reconciliation  between  imitation  and  novelty  seems  to  be 
suggested  by  the  key  phrase,  learning  in  art.  The  poet  is  to 
know  the  masters,  but  not  necessarily  in  a  spirit  of  servile  fol- 
lowing." Puttenham^'  advocates  learned  verse,  and  sets 
Chaucer  high,  not  so  much  for  his  character  drawing,  apparently, 
or  his  history  telling,  or  his  humanity,  as  for  his  learning.  This 
reconciliation  is,  however,  only  suggested.  In  the  hands  of  Dry- 
den,  it  lapses  into  a  flat  contradiction.  He  urges  that  art  is  the 
better  for  an  infusion  of  learning,  for  the  regulating  effect  of  a 
basic  idea,  and  for  the  quality  of  novelty.  His  opinion  concern- 
ing the  necessity  for  learning  appears  in  an  almost  impossibly 
high  criterion  which  he  sets  up  for  the  epic  poet.^^ 

"In  an  epic  poet,  one  who  is  worthy  of  that  name,  besides  an 
universal  genius,  is  required  universal  learning,  together  with 
all  those  qualities  and  acquisitions  which  I  have  named  above, 
and  as  many  more  as  I  have,  through  haste  or  negligence,  omit- 
ted." At  the  same  time,^*  he  maintains  that  of  both  poetry  and 
painting,  "Invention  is  the  first  part,"  and  that  "Imitators  are 
but  a  servile  kind  of  cattle. "^^  And  again,^**  "The  copier  is  that 
servile  imitator,  to  whom  Horace  gives  no  better  name  than  that 
of  animal.  "^^ 

Another  subject  which  very  largely  concerned  all  early  critics 
was  the  function  of  the  ugly  or  the  repulsive  in  art.  According 
to  the  standards  most  cited  among  the  ancients,  heroic  literature 
dealt  with  the  noble  and  could  not  introduce  the  base  unless  as 
a  subject  for  disapprobation.  Comedy,  on  the  other  hand,  was 
to  deal  primarily  with  the  absurdities  of  low  or  base  characters. 
Thus  the  problem  of  the  ugly  in  art  was  closely  interwoven  with 
the  matter  of  the  intermixture  of  types,  the  permissibility  of 
any  form  of  tragi-comedy,  as  it  was  called.  This  subject  is  dis- 
cussed in  chapter  IV.  We  may,  however,  note  here  more  specifi- 
cally just  what  ugliness  might,  according  to  sixteenth  and  seven- 
teenth century  English  critics,  be  introduced,  and  the  circum- 


11.  C/.  Dryden,  A  Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting  [1695].  K.  II,   134. 

12.  /.  c.    [1589].   Sm.   II,   64. 

13.  Discourse  Concerning  the  Original  and  Progress  of  Satire   [1693].  K.  II,  43. 

14.  A  Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting   [1695].  K.  II,   138. 

15.  Translation    of    Imitatores    servum   pecus    [!]. 

16.  Dedication  of  the  ^neis    [1697].  K.   II,   199. 

17.  For   a   fine   specimen    of  the   grotesque   and   muddled   logic   of   which   Dryden 
was  often  capable,  see  the  pa.ssage  immediately  following  this  citation. 


Materials  Suitable  for  Literature  57 

stances  under  which  it  might  be  so  introduced.  WcblM?'"  with 
his  usual  conventionality,  but  with  some  facility  in  expression, 
admits  the  ugly  when  disji^uised : 

"In  a  comedy  it  is  [not]  needful  to  exhibit  all  the  actions 
openly,  as  such  as  are  cruel,  un-honest,  or  ugly ;  but  such  things 
may  better  be  declared  by  some  meet  and  handsome  words,  after 
what  sort  they  are  supposed  to  be  done." 

Puttenham^^  adds  that  the  poet  should  not  write  "vain  con- 
ceits, or  vicious,  or  infamous."  Meres,  as  with  his  ideas  of  wit, 
so  with  his  idea  of  the  ugly,  is  broader;  or  at  least  freer.  We  can 
take  pleasure  in  deformed  creatures  artificially  painted.^"  More- 
over, quoting  from  Plutarch : 

"Some  things  that  are  not  excellent  of  themselves  are  good 
for  some,  because  they  are  meet  for  them:  so  some  things  are 
commended  in  poets  w^hich  are  fit  and  correspondent  for  the 
persons  they  speak  of,  although  in  themselves  they  are  filthy 
and  not  to  be  spoken ;  as  lame  Demonides  wished  that  the  shoes 
that  were  stolen  from  him  might  fit  his  feet  that  had  stolen 
them." 

Sir  Robert  Howard-^  will  not  admit  all  subjects  on  the  stage, 
but  cares  little  for  the  subterfuges  by  which  the  Frencii  avoid 
unpleasant  features.    But  we  may  quote  his  own  words : 

"Seneca  making  choice  of  Medea,  Hyppolitus,  and  Hercules 
ORtus,  it  was  impossible  to  show  Medea  throwing  old  mangled 
^son  into  her  age-renewincr  caldron,  or  to  present  the  scattered 
limbs  of  Hyppolitus  upon  the  stage,  or  show  Hercules  burning 
upon  his  own  funeral  pyle. 

So  that  it  appears  a  fault  to  chose  such  subjects  for  the  stage, 
but  much  greater  to  affect  that  method  which  those  subjects  en- 
force ;  and  therefore  the  French  seem  much  mistaken,  who  with- 
out the  necessity  sometimes  commit  the  error;  and  this  is  as 
plainly  decided  by  the  same  author  [Horace]  in  his  preceding 
words : 


18.  I.  c.    [1536].   Sm.  I,   293. 

19.  I.  c.   [1589].  Sm.  II.  24. 

20.  Paltadifi  Taniia    [1598].   Sm.   IT,   309.   311.    " 

21.  Preface  to   Four  New   Plays    [1665].   Sp.   II,   99. 


58  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

Aut  ajritiir  res  in  sopnis  aut  acta  refertur: 
Segnius  irritant  animos  demissa  per  aurem, 
Quam  qua3  sunt  ociilis  subjecta  fidelibus,  et  quas 
Ipse  sibi  tradit  spectator. — 

By  Avliich  he  directly  declares  his  judgment,  that  everything 
makes  more  impression  presented  than  related :  nor  indeed  can 
anyone  rationally  assert  the  contrary,  for  if  they  affirm  other- 
wise, they  do  by  consequence  maintain  that  a  whole  play  might 
be  as  well  related  as  acted.  Therefore,  whoever  chooses  a  subject 
that  forces  him  to  relations  is  to  blame,  and  he  that  does  it  with- 
out the  necessity  of  the  subject  is  much  more." 

Dryden  does  not  touch  this  point  specifically,  Lisideius,  echo- 
ing French  doctrine,^-  finds  it  "convenient  and  beautiful"  to 
put  certain  actions  behind  the  scenes  and  so  avoid  the  "tumult" 
which  often  makes  an  English  stage  "like  the  theaters  where  they 
fight  prizes." 

This,  however,  is  not  a  mere  exclusion  of  action  for^^  [Lisi- 
deius] : 

"Comeille  says  judiciously,  that  the  poet  is  not  obliged  to 
expose  to  view  all  particular  actions  which  conduce  to  the  princi- 
pal :  he  ought  to  select  such  of  them  to  be  seen,  which  will  appear 
with  the  greatest  beauty,  either  by  the  magnificence  of  the  show, 
or  the  vehemence  of  passion  which  they  produce,  or  some  other 
charm  which  they  have  in  them;  and  let  the  rest  arrive  to  the 
audience  by  narration.  'Tis  a  great  mistake  in  us  to  believe  the 
French  present  no  part  of  the  action  on  the  stage ;  everj^  altera- 
tion or  crossing  of  a  design,  every  new-sprung  passion,  and  turn 
of  it,  is  a  part  of  the  action,  and  much  the  noblest,  except  we 
conceive  nothing  to  be  action  till  they  come  to  blows;  as  if  the 
painting  of  the  hero's  mind  were  not  more  properly  the  poet's 
work  than  the  strength  of  his  body." 

Again,^*  after  quoting  Horace  whose  opinion  he  believes  is 
not  in  discord  with  that  of  Comeille,  Lisideius  adds: 

"Those  actions  which  by  reason  of  their  cruelty  will  cause 
aversion  in  us,  or  by  reason  of  their  impossibility,  unbelief,  ought 
either  wholly  to  be  avoided  by  a  poet,  or  only  delivered  by  nar- 


22.  An   Exaay  of  Dramatic  Poesy    [1668],   K.   I,    62. 

23.  lb.    64. 

24.  lb.    e.5. 


Materials  Suitable  for  Literature  59 

ration.  To  which  we  may  have  hjave  to  add  sudi  as  to  avoid 
tumult  (as  was  before  hinted),  or  to  reduce  tlie  phjt  into  a  more 
reasonable  compass  of  time,  or  for  defect  of  beauty  in  them,  are 
rather  to  be  rebated  than  presented  to  the  eye."  For  example: 
"We  find  Ben  Jonson  urging  them  [examples]  in  his  Magnclic 
Lady,  where  one  comes  out  from  dinner,  and  relates  the  quarrels 
and  disorders  of  it,  to  save  the  undecent  appearance  of  them  on 
the  stage,  and  to  abbreviate  the  story. ' ' 

He  then  shows  that  Ben  Jonson  in  this  particular  case,  as 
well  as  in  principle,  was  following  a  Latin  model.  Dryden, 
Neander  speaking,  grants  "a  great  part"  of  Lisideius's  conten- 
tions, then  sums  up^'^  as  follows : 

"If  we  are  to  be  blamed  for  showing  too  much  of  the  action, 
the  French  are  as  faulty  for  discovering  too  little  of  it :  a  mean 
betwixt  both  should  be  observed  by  every  judicious  writer,  so  as 
the  audience  may  neither  be  left  unsatisfied  by  not  seeing  what 
is  beautiful,  or  shocked  by  beholding  what  is  either  incredible  or 
indecent." 

It  might  well  seem  that  such  doctrines  would  run  foul  of  the 
other  equally  primitive  doctrine,  that  truth,  or  verisimilitude, 
should  also  characterize  good  art.  But  the  principle  of  veri- 
similitude seems  to  have  been  confined  very  largely  to  the  art  of 
using  only  such  material  as  could  be  made  to  seem  real  or  of 
making  what  the  author  chose  to  use  real.  The  further  idea 
brought  out  by  the  modern  realists,  that  a  half  truth  in  art,  as  in 
life,  is  often  equivalent  to  a  falsehood, — this  seems  notably  ab- 
sent from  all  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  century  criticism,  while 
there  is  little  or  no  implication  of  it  in  what  followed  in  the 
eighteenth  century. 

Webbe,  almost  at  the  beginning  of  English  criticism,  sounds 
a  note  which,  though  not  exactly  on  this  topic,  is  on  a  matter 
universally  associated  with  it.  He  states,  somewhat  dogmatically, 
that  a  poet  should  write  from  personal  experience.-''  Closely 
akin  to  this  matter  is  the  question  :  May  we,  or  shall  we,  write  con- 
cerning that  which  is  remote  from  our  own  experience  ?  The  to 
us  important  problem,  whether  a  writer  shall  choose  a  subject 


25.  lb.    75. 

26.  I.   c.    Sm.    I,    295.      Cf.    also   Puttenham.   /.   c.    Sm.    II.    3.      Such    experienc«. 
thinks    Webbe,    comes    from    traveling. 


60  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

remote  or  one  near  at  hand  and  familiar  seems  to  have  troubled 
the  Elizabethan  and  seventeenth  century  critics  very  little.  The 
principal  consideration  in  the  matter  is  half  facetiously  summed 
up  by  Davenant:-" 

"Man,  continuing  the  appetites  of  his  first  childhood  till  he 
arrive  at  his  second,  which  is  more  f  roward,  must  be  quieted  with 
something  that  he  thinks  excellent  which  he  may  call  his  own, 
but  when  he  sees  the  like  in  other  places,  not  staying  to  compare 
them,  wrangles  at  all  he  has.  This  leads  us  to  observe  the 
craftiness  of  the  comics,  who  are  only  willing  when  they  describe 
humor  (and  humor  is  the  drunkenness  of  a  nation  which  no 
sleep  can  cure)  to  lay  the  scene  in  their  own  country  as  know- 
ing, we  are,  like  the  son  of  Noah,  so  little  distasted  to  behold 
each  other's  shame,  that  we  delight  to  see  even  that  of  a  father; 
yet  when  they  would  set  forth  greatness  and  excellent  virtue, 
which  is  the  theme  of  tragedy,  publicly  to  the  people,  they  wisely, 
to  avoid  the  quarrels  of  neighborly  envy,  remove  the  scene  from 
home. ' ' 

Davenant^^  is,  however,  inclined  to  exclude  the  supernatural 
as  a  bit  childish,  speaking  with  some  scorn  of  ''such  fables  as 
meanly  illustrate  a  probable  heaven  by  the  fashion  and  dignity 
of  courts,  and  make  a  resemblance  of  hell  out  of  the  dreams  of 
frightened  women." 

That  the  scene  may  be  moved  into  the  realm  of  mythology 
seems  generally  to  be  taken  for  granted  ;^^  but  it  is  interesting  to 
find  it  explicitly  stated  in  the  doctrines  of  Comeille.^°  Even 
mythology,  though,  is  restrained  by  the  law  that  it  must  seem 
probable. 

Dryden^^  boldly  defends  the  supernatural. 

"If  any  man  object  to  the  improbabilities  of  a  spirit  appear- 
ing, or  of  a  palace  raised  by  magic,  I  boldly  answer  him,  that 
an  heroic  poet  is  not  tied  to  a  bare  representation  of  what  is 
true,  or  exceeding  probable,  but  that  he  may  let  himself  loose 


27.  Preface    to    Gondibert     [1650].     Sp.    II,     12.       Cf.    quotation    from    Sidney 
on  p.    31. 

28.  Preface  to  Gondibert  [1650].  Sp.  II,  5. 

29.  Webbe.  however   [Sm.  I,   293],  adds  the  proviso  that  the  gods  should  not  be 
brought   in   except   for   great   actions. 

30.  DUcourx  de  la  Tragidie   [1660]. 

31.  EKsay  of  Ueroic  Plays  [1672].  K.  I,   153. 


Materials  Suitable  for  Literature  61 

to  visionary  objects,  and  to  the  representation  of  such  tliinf^  as 
depending  not  on  sense,  and  therefore  not  to  be  comprehended  by 
knowledge,  may  give  him  a  freer  scope  for  imagination. 

**  ****••••• 

Some  men  think  that  they  have  raised  a  great  argument 
against  the  use  of  spectres  and  magic  in  heroic  poetry,  by  saying 
they  are  unnatural ;  but  whether  they  or  I  believe  there  are  such 
things,  is  not  material ;  'tis  enough  that,  for  aught  we  know, 
they  may  be  in  nature;  and  whatever  is,  or  may  be,  is  not  prop- 
erly unnatural." 

Sir  Richard  Blackmore^^  thinks  mythology  not  essential  to  an 
epic,  yet  that  "interesting  heaven  and  hell  in  the  matter  does 
mightily  raise  the  subject." 

But  if  the  remote  or  the  unreal  be  not  necessary  for  the  illu- 
sion of  art,  fiction  may  sometimes  be.  Such  fact  appears  in  the 
criticism  we  are  considering.  Drummond^^  says  of  Ben  Jon.son : 
"He  thought  not  Bartas  a  poet,  but  a  verser,  because  he  wrote 
not  fiction";  a  view  echoed  by  Davenant:^* 

"For  wise  poets  think  it  more  worthy  to  seek  out  truth  in 
the  passions  than  to  record  the  truth  of  actions,  and  practice  to 
describe  mankind  just  as  we  are  persuaded  or  guided  by  instinct, 
not  particular  persons  as  they  are  lifted  or  levelled  by  the  force 
of  fate,  it  being  nobler  to  contemplate  the  general  history  of 
nature  than  a  selected  diary  of  fortune."  And  again^''  "Truth 
narrative  and  past  is  the  idol  of  historians,  who  worship  a  dead 
thing,  and  truth  operative,  and  by  effects  continually  alive  is  the 
mistress  of  poets."  Sir  Robert  Howard^"  says  "Poets  need  not 
argue  well."    Later,  but  more  flippantly,  we  have  Stirling." 

"The  treasures  of  poetry  cannot  be  better  bestowed  tlum 
upon  the  apparelling  of  truth;  and  truth  cannot  be  better  ap- 


32.  Preface  to  Prince  Arthur   [1695].  Sp.  Ill,  239. 

33.  CoTtvemationx  of  Ben  Jonxon  and  Drummond  [1619].  Sp.  I.  211.  Sir 
Philip  Sidney's  views  are  omitted  here,  as  they  are  a  part  of  his  previously  dis- 
cussed idealism,  which,  from  its  very  nature,  deals  chiefly  in  fiction.  See  Apology. 
Sm.  I,   167,   168,   184,   185. 

34.  Preface  to  Gondibert    [1650].   Sp.   II,   3. 

35.  lb.   11. 

36.  Preface  to  The  Duke  of  Lerma  [1668].  Sp.  IT.  107.  See  Wylie.  43.  Cor- 
neille  has  a  curious  remark  on  the  same  subject  to  the  effect  that  unity  of  timi- 
and  place  [g.  v.]  permits  us  to  dispense  with  the  probable,  so  long  as  we  do  noi 
have  the  impossible,  but  not  in  comedy   [Dvirourii  de  la  Tragidie].^ 

37.  AnacriM.1    [1634?].    Sp.    I,    186.      See    Ssintsbury    II,    196. 


62  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

parelled  to  please"  young  lovers  than  with  the  excellences  of 
poetry. ' ' 

Still  later  Rymer''^  quotes  Aristotle  to  the  effect  that ' '  Poetry 
is  something  more  excellent  and  more  philosophical  than  his- 
tory. ' '  On  the  other  hand  we  have  Nash^*^ — extreme  as  always — 
declaiming  against  the  lies  of  art,  and  Hobbes*"  declaring  that 
both  poet  and  liistorian  should  write  only  matter  of  fact.  It  will 
be  well  to  recall  though  that  Hobbes,  like  Bacon,  was  a  philoso- 
pher with  a  good  enough  style  for  writing  translations  or  com- 
mon-sense essays,  but  with  no  more  appreciation  of  literary  fire 
or  illusion  than  a  calculating  machine;  while  Nash — though  es- 
sentially literary  in  temper — was  too  violent  for  trustworthy 
criticism. 

The  idea  of  probability  in  fiction  a.s  a  guiding  principle  in- 
stead of  strict  truth,  like  most — except  the  rudimentary- — of  the 
critical  canons,  came  later.  "To  make  great  actions  credible  is 
the  principal  art  of  poets,"  says  Davenant.*^  But  most  of  the 
views  on  this  point  came  after  Corneille,*^  who  quotes  Aristotle 
to  the  effect  that  events  should  have  verisimilitude  and  be 
necessary.  Coming  on  the  heels  of  Davenant's  criticism  is 
Rymer's*^  critique  of  Davenant's  poem,  Gondihert.  One  of  the 
faults  is  improbability.  Similar  views  are  expressed  by  Phillips,** 
but  Phillips  goes  a  step  nearer  to  modern  realism  in  his  views: 
a  poet  should  stay  as  near  truth  as  possible.  He  should  not  be 
"positively  contradictory  to  the  truth  of  history."  Rymer,*^ 
again,  severely  criticises  the  improbable  in  Othello.  After  the 
murder,  we  have : 

"0th. — Why,  how  should  she  be  murdered? 

Em. — Alas,  who  knows? 

0th. — You  heard  her  say  herself,  it  was  not  I. 


38.  Preface  to  Translation  of  Rapin's  Reilectiorut  on  Aristotle's  Treatise  of  Poesy 
[1674].   Sp.  II,   171. 

39.  Anatomy  of  Absurdity   [1589].   Sm.  xxix,  and  I,   323.     Cf.  also  Sm.   xvi  for 
remark  of  Puttenham. 

40.  Preface  to  his  Translation  of  the  Odyssey   [1675].    Sp.   II,   70. 

41.  I.  c.   [1650].  Sp.  II,  11. 

42.  Discours    de    la    Tragedie     [1660].    Cf.    a    late    echo    in    Collier,    Immorality 
of  the  English  Stage   [1698].   Sp.  Ill,   278.     Cf.  also  Poetics,  xxv. 

43.  Preface    to    the    Translation    of    Rapin's    Reflections    on    Aristotle's    Treatise 
of  Poesy   [1674].   Sp.  II,   169. 

44.  I.  c.   [1675].  Sp.  II,  268. 

45.  Short  View  of  Tragedy   [1693].  Sp.  II,  252. 


Materials  Suitable  for  Literature  63 

Em. — She  did  so;  I  must  needs  report  a  truth. 

0th. — Slie's  like  a  liar  gone  to  burn  in  Ilrll. 

'Twas  I  that  did  it. 

Em. — 0,  the  more  angel  she, 

And  you  the  blacker  devil ! 

0th. — She  turned  to  folly,  and  she  was  an  whore. 

Em. — Thou  dost  belie  her,  and  thou  art  a  devil. 

0th. — She  was  false  as  water. 

Em. — Thou  art  ra.sh  as  fire, 

To  say  that  she  was  false :  O,  she  was  heavenly  true. 

In  this  kind  of  dialogue,  they  continue  for  forty  lines  farther, 
before  she  bethinks  herself  to  cry  murder. 

Em. — Help,  help,  O  help  ! 

The  moor  has  killed  my  mistress !  murder,  murder ! 

And  so  Rymer  discusses  pretty  much  the  whole  of  the  play. 

Dryden  distinctly,  though  as  we  shall  see  somewhat  inconsist- 
ently, advocates  a  close  adherence  to  nature.    As  here  }^ 

"Though  the  fancy  may  be  great  and  the  words  flowing,  yet 
the  soul  is  but  half  satisfied  when  there  is  not  truth  in  the  foun- 
dation. ' ' 

The  same  idea  is  implied  in  his  criticism  of  Ariosto  :*^ 

"His  style  is  luxurious,  without  majesty  or  decency,  and  his 
adventures  without  the  compass  of  nature  and  possibilitj'. " 

This  same  idea  of  fidelity  to  nature  occurs  elsewhere  in  Dry- 
den's  writing,*^  but  is  often  modified  [or  \dtiated?]  by  the 
qualification  that  only  by  imitating  the  ancients  can  we  observe 
nature,  since  nature,  never  changing,  was  the  same  for  them  as 
for  us  [ !]. 

This  appreciation  of  the  necessity  for  adhering  to  nature 
verges  upon  realism  of  a  modern  type  when  he  comes  to  discuss 
what  we  to-day  call  local  color.  The  first  allusion  to  this  from 
him  is  in  the  Preface  to  Troilus  and  Cressida,*^  where  he  ex- 
presses the  doctrine  that  consistency  in  the  manners  attributed 


46.  Defense  of  an  Essaii  of  Dramatic  Poeny   [1668].  K.   I.   121. 

47.  Discourxr  Concerning  the  Original  and  Progrrt^  of  satire  flfiS^]-  K. 
II,    27. 

48.  For  example:  A   Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting  [169:>].  K.  II.   134. 

49.  [1679].  K.  I.  514.  Also  217.  Cf.  also  Preface  to  the  Translation  of  Ovid's 
Epistles  [1680.]  K.  I.  236.  An  allusion  to  something  of  the  sort  occurs  in  the 
Preface  to  Annus  3firabilis   [1667.   K.   I.    13],   but   the  words  are  amtiguous. 


64  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Ctiticism 

to  characters  requires  attention  to  the  differences  of  "age  or 
sex,  of  climates,  or  quality  of  the  persons,  or  their  present  condi- 
tion. "^^ 

Having  gone  thus  far,  it  is  not  surprising  that  Dryden, 
towards  the  end  of  his  career,^^  attained  to  the  conception  of 
scientific  impersonality  in  art,  a  foretaste  of  what  we  cannot  but 
consider  the  highest  attainment  of  modern  realism.  He  does 
not  himself  appear  to  recognize  the  importance  of  his  conclusion, 
but  rather  blunders  into  it  in  the  act  of  criticising  certain  writers 
who  infused  too  much  of  the  temperament  of  the  writer  into 
their  puppets.  Yet  even  this  much  of  perception  of  the  principle 
must  be  considered  a  notable  advance  for  the  day  in  which  it  was 
written  down. 

At  the  same  time  Dryden  was  not  a  realist.  And  he  differed 
from  the  modern  realists  not  only  in  admitting  the  suppression 
of  truth  whenever  the  truth  was  inconvenient  or  ugly,  but  also 
in  advising  a  departure  from  the  actual  character  of  the  material 
used. 

Nature,  according  to  his  theory,  is  not  truthfully  represented 
by  a  photographic  reproduction.  A  reproduction  of  nature  is  a 
sort  of  compromise  between  the  powers  and  prejudices  of  the 
observer  on  the  one  hand  and  the  facts  of  nature  on  the  other.^^ 


50.  The  best  of  all  the  discussions  of  the  seventeenth  century  on  reality  in  man- 
ners is  that  of  Dennis  [The.  Impartial  Critic.  1693.  Sp.  Ill,  150  et  seq.'i  where 
he  points  out  the  different  attitudes  of  the  Greeks  and  the  Italians  on  the  one 
hand  and  of  Western  Europeans  on  the  other  towards  sensual  love,  and  observes 
that  these  differences  make  the  dramatic  forms  in  such  matters  different  for  the 
different  national  literatures.  Dennis's  criticism  is  too  detailed  to  be  quoted  in  full. 
The  chief  point  is  that  love  dialogue,  which  is  suitable  in  the  North,  would  be  un- 
natural in  Greece  or  Italy  where,  under  the  influences  of  the  heat,  lovers  do  not 
waste  time  over  dialogue. 

51.  A   Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting   [1695].   K.   II,   142. 

52.  This  brings  up  a  fundamental,  yet  perplexing  question  of  modern  criticism: 
How  far  is  merely  photographic  faithfulness  true  to  nature.  A  Dutch  painter  who 
reproduces  every  vein  of  his  cabbage,  or,  like  Van  Dyke,  every  stitch  in  a  lace 
collar,  or  a  preRaphaelite,  who  puts  every  leaf  on  his  tree  and  every  petal  on 
his  meadow  blossoms,  may  he  at  once  scientifically  correct  and  psychologically  false. 
The  eye  on  first  looking  at  such  a  picture,  sees  every  detail,  and  conceives  the  scene 
as  a  mass  of  details.  But  on  looking  at  such  objects  in  nature,  though  we  may  be 
able  to  discern  such  details  when  our  attention  is  called  to  them,  we  literally  do 
not   see  them  ordinarily,   our  attention  being  fixed  only  upon   the  general  effect. 

Mr.  William  Butler  Yeats,  in  designing  scenery  for  his  theater  in  Dublin,  has 
gone  to  the  other  extreme  and  has  used  only  the  simplest  sort  of  suggestive  scenery, 
such  being  all  we  could  in  reality  see,  if  our  attention  were  centered  upon  the  actors. 
Similarly,  when  our  attention  is  fixed  upon  the  scene  as  a  whole,  we  do  not  notice 
details,  even  though  there  be  no  such  powerfully  magnetic  an  influence  as  human 
action  to  absorb  attention.  These  principles,  as  a  brief  logical  deduction  will 
show,    are   implied    in    Dryden's   dictum,    though    he   may    not   have   been    aware   of   it. 


Materials  Suitable  for  Literature  65 

For  the  representation  to  appear  yrohahie,  it  must  present 
nature  as  the  observer  is  accustomed  to  see  it:'"'' 

"  'Tis  not  necessary  that  there  should  be  Jiistorical  truth  in 
it;  but  always  necessary  that  there  should  be  a  likeness  of  truth, 
something  that  is  more  than  barely  possible :  probable  being  that 
which  succeeds,  or  happens,  oftener  than  it  misses.  To  invent 
therefore  a  probability,  and  to  make  it  wonderful,  is  the  most 
difficult  undertaking  in  the  art  of  poetry;  for  that  which  is  not 
wonderful  is  not  great;  and  that  which  is  not  probable  will  not 
delight  a  reasonable  audience. ' ' 

The  idea  of  the  unnatural  heightening  of  the  drama"  implied 
in  this  passage  is,  if  interpreted  more  precisely,  of  the  same 
nature.  Things,  for  example,  which  strike  us  as  funny,  are  proba- 
bly heightened  in  the  representation  of  them  to  the  mind  of  the 
observer  by  the  heightening  or  intensifying  of  the  scene  which 
takes  place  in  his  imagination.  So  a  representation  of  nature 
must  be  heightened.  A  serious  play,  thinks  Dry  den,  "is  indeed 
the  representation  of  nature,  but  'tis  nature  wrought  up  to  an 
higher  pitch. ' ' 

In  the  Essay  of  Heroic  Plays,  he  says :"' 

"It  is  very  clear  to  all  who  understand  poetry,  that  serious 
plays  ought  not  to  imitate  conversation  too  nearly.  If  nothing 
were  to  be  raised  above  that  level,  the  foundation  of  poetrj' 
would  be  destroyed." 

]\Ioreover,  '"" '  Prose  is  not  to  be  used  in  a  serious  play  because 
too  near  nature."     The  next  step  in  this  curious  shifting  of 


53.  Preface  to  TroUus  and  Cressida   [1679].   K.  I,   209. 

54.  Essay  of  Dram.  P.  [1668],  Neander — Dryden — speaking  K.  I.  100.  Cf. 
also  Bohn,  I.  c.  Over  against  the  rational  heightening  of  nature  just  mentioned 
must  be  set  a  more  irrational  explanation  of  Dryden,  written  27  years  later  [ParalM 
of  Poetry  and  Painting.  1695.  K.  II,  137. [: 

"Truth  is  the  object  of  our  understanding,  as  good  is  of  our  will;  and  the 
understanding  can  no  more  be  delighted  with  a  lie,  than  the  will  can  choose  an  ap- 
parent evil.  As  truth  is  the  end  of  all  our  speculations,  bo  the  discovery  of  it  is 
the  pleasure  of  them:  and  since  a  true  knowledge  of  nature  gives  us  pleasure,  a  lively 
imitatiou  of  it,  either  in  poetry  or  painting,  must  of  necessity  produce  a  much 
greater:  for  both  these  arts,  as  I  said  before,  are  not  only  true  imitations  of  nature, 
but  of  the  best  nature,  of  that  which  is  wrought  up  to  a  nobler  pitch.  They  pre- 
sent us  with  images  more  perfect  than  the  life  in  any  individual;  and  we  have  the 
pleasure  to  see  all  the  scattered  beauties  of  nature  united  by  a  happy  chemistry 
without  its  deformities  or  faults." 

55.  [1672].   K.   I,   148. 

56.  Defence  of  An  Essay   of  Dram.   P.    [1668].   K.    I,    114. 


66  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

his  ground,  the  defense  of  rhyme  in  a  play,  has  already  been 
quoted.^^ 

Another  of  Dryden's  departures  from  nature  is  in  the  to  us 
now  familiar  doctrine  of  the  inculcation  of  virtue  and  the  mag- 
nification of  the  worthy.  The  subject  of  a  dramatic  or  of  an 
epic  poet  must  be  great  and  noble.^^  His  reconciliation  of  such 
an  eclectic  principle  with  the  admonition  to  follow  nature  sheds 
but  little  light,  and  is  rather  a  darkening  of  counsel ;  but  is  of 
great  interest  both  as  an  example  of  the  confusion  into  which 
Dryden  can  sometimes  fall,  and  also  as  an  illustration  of  the 
difficulty  experienced  in  an  arbitrary  attempt  to  reconcile  the 
irreconcilable.^^ 

A  more  radical  departure  from  nature  is  advocated  by  Dry- 
den in  his  Dedication  of  theyEneis,^'^  where  a  momentary  jingoism 
leads  him  to  say  that  a  poet  may  justly  be  partial  to  his  country 
"for  he  is  not  tied  to  truth,  or  fettered  by  the  laws  of  history." 

An  important  point  of  discrimination  for  a  poet  is  his  choice 
of  characters.  Webbe*'^  insists  that  characters  be  consistent ;  that 
a  character  be  not  "now  a  bold  boaster,  and  the  same  straightway 
a  wise,  wary  man,  for  that  is  passing  absurd."  So  also  must 
fitness  be  observed :  "as  it  is  meet  and  agreeable®^  everywhere  a 
man  to  be  stout,  a  woman  fearful,  a  servant  crafty,  a  young  man 
gentle. ' ' 

Puttenham^^  observes  that  high  poetry  (hymns,  historical 
poems,  and  tragedies)  deal  with  affairs  of  the  gods,  noble  tales, 
the  fortunes  of  princes,  and  notable  affairs,  as  of  war  and  peace ; 
"mean"  [medium  high]  poetry  deals  with  the  lives  and  business 
of  lawyers,  gentlemen,  merchants,  good  householders  and  honest 
citizens,  and  gives  common  conversation  "of  the  civiler  and 
better  sort  of  men."  Such  style  appears  in  comedies  and  inter- 
ludes and  common  poetry  of  love  and  such  matters.  Eclogues 
deal  with  the  lowest  style,  that  of  the  common  artificer,  serving- 


57.  lb.     See  also  Bohn,  I.  c.  68.     Also  p.  17.    Note. 

58.  Parallel    of   Poetry    and    Painting    [1695].    K.    II,    129,    130.      Cf.    also    Sir 
Richard  Blackmore,   Preface   to  Prince  Arthur  £1695].   Sp.   Ill,   239. 

59.  A    ParaUel  of  Poetry  and  Painting   [1695].   K.   II,    136,    1«7. 

60.  [1697].  K.  II,   191. 

61.  I.  c.    [1586].   Sm.  I,   292. 

62.  Agreeable  here  seems  to  have  the  meaning  in  conformity  or  consistent.     Cf. 
the  use  in  the  sentence  preceding  this. 

63.  /.   c.   [1589].   Sm.  II,   158. 


Materials  Suitable  for  Literature  iil 

man,  ycoinan,  groom,  hiishandniati,  (iay-lahorcr,  sail(n%  shepherd, 
swinelierd,  and  the  like.  But  in  all  these  styles  the  virtues  and 
vices  recorded  are  to  be  in  accord  with  the  type:  that  is,  the 
virtues  praised  and  the  vices  condemned  in  high  persons  are  not 
the  same  as  those  praised  and  condemned  in  low  persons,  and 
vice  versa.  Hobbes"*  has  a  similar  classification,  conceiving 
court  matters  as  fit  for  epic  or  tragedy,  city  matters  for  satire  or 
comedy,  country  matters  for  eclogues.  Milton  observes  in  one 
place*^"'  that  the  "main  consistence  of  a  true  poem"  is  "the  choice 
of  such  persons  as  they  ought  to  introduce. ' ' 

Dryden,  in  this  matter,  as  in  his  treatment  of  the  general  con- 
nection between  the  imitation  of  nature  and  the  inculcation  of 
an  ideal,  is  far  from  logical.  That  he  believes  in  a  sort  of  realist's 
fidelity  to  nature  is  plain.  For  one  thing  a  character  must  be 
consistent.  Whatever  the  character  says  or  does  must  be  consist- 
ent with  the  manners  originally  attributed  to  that  character; 
and  the  habits  exhibited  must  be  in  accordance  with  the  "degrees 
and  humors"  of  the  character."**  Again,"^  at  the  end  of  his 
career,  he  writes  that  the  thoughts  of  a  character  must  come 
"more  or  less  naturally"  from  the  person.  In  the  same  es.say'* 
he  applauds  the  manner  in  which  Chaucer's  pilgrims  are  distin- 
guished as  individuals  in  inclinations,  physiognomies  and  per- 
sons. This  doctrine,  if  not  perhaps  entirely  sound  from  the 
standpoint  of  a  medical  man,^^  is  yet  more  sound  than  mo.st  of 
those  held  in  its  day.  Unfortunately  it  is  vitiated  by  the  untem- 
pered  idealism  we  have  already  noticed.  When  he  finds  his 
doctrines  accused  of  producing  "a  faultless  monster,  which  the 
world  ne'er  knew,"^"  he  recants.  At  the  same  time  when  he 
wishes,  in  order  to  arouse  pity,  to  use  historical  persons,  some 
portions  of  whose  characters  might  arouse  hatred,  he  does  not 
hesitate  to  modify  history.     The  deformities  of  his  Antony  and 


64.  Sp.   xxxi. 

65.  The   Ketmon   of  Chureh-OovernmerU   Urged  against  Prelaty.      Bk.    II    [1641]. 

Sp.    I,    198. 

66.  Parallel   of  Poetry   and   Painting    [169r>].    K.    II.    128.    142. 

67.  Preface  to  the  Fables   [1700].  K.   II,  2.56. 

68.  /'>.   262. 

69.  What,  for  example,  would  Dryden  do  with  such  a  character  as  Oliver  Won 
dell  Holmes'  Elsie  Vernier:  or,  if  objection  be  raised  to  the  possibility  of  the  ex- 
istence of  such,  to  his  Myrtle  Hazard.  Again,  is  it  possible,  outside  of  plays  and 
novels,  to  discern  any  accord  between  a  man's  face  or  his  manner,  and  his  character! 

70.  A   Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting   [1695].  K.   11.    I'JS 


68  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

Cleopatra^^  he  throws  into  the  shade,  in  order  that  pity  and  not 
liatred  may  be  aroused.  At  other  times  the  virtues  of  a  hero, 
such  as  Achilles,"^  he  thinks,  may  be  exhibited  without  his  defects. 
Immediately  after  we  have  the  nearest  aproach  to  a  reconcilia- 
tion between  realism  and  idealism.  The  manners  of  the  hero 
"are  poetically  good  if  they  are  of  a  piece:  though  where  a 
character  of  perfect  virtue  is  set  before  us,  it  is  more  lovely ;  for 
there  the  whole  hero  is  to  be  imitated." 

A  copious  discussion  of  what  is  practically  a  part  of  the  doc- 
trine of  characters,  the  human  motives  by  which  characters 
should  be  moved,  was  introduced  by  Corneille.  To  start  though 
with  Aristotle."  The  pity  and  fear  of  tragedy  are  not  the  real 
pitj"^  and  fear  of  life,  but  the  pity  and  fear  which  are  felt  by 
sympathy  in  such  fashion  as  to  give  pleasure.  We  may  put  this 
into  modem  language  in  this  fashion.  To  see  the  passion  of  a 
murderer  on  the  stage  or  the  grief  of  the  bereaved  may  give 
us  pleasure ;  and  Ave  pay  to  see  it ;  whereas  the  same  emotions  in 
real  life  would  provoke  the  other  extreme  of  sensation.  If  in  the 
theater  we  so  far  forget  ourselves  as  to  take  what  passes  before 
us  for  real,  then  the  painful  emotions  become  ugly,  we  hiss  the 
villain,  applaud  the  hero,  as  though  in  real  life,  and  the  whole 
degenerates  into  melodrama.^*  Of  this  there  seems  to  be  little 
in  the  criticism  of  our  period.  Corneille,''^  however,  quotes 
another  theory  of  Aristotle.  Aristotle  says  all  action  passes  be- 
tween friends,  enemies,  or  persons  indifferent  to  one  another. 
If  an  enemy  kill  or  wishes  to  kill  an  enemy,  our  commiseration  is 
not  moved.  If,  of  two  mutually  indifferent  persons,  one  kill  the 
other,  it  doe>;  not  move  us.  But  when  persons  whom  birth  or 
affection  has  bound  together  wish  to  kill  one  another,  it  moves 
us  marvelously  to  tragedy.  The  explanation,  he  continues,  is 
that  the  opposition  of  sentiments  gives  pleasure.  Of  this  we  have 
little  in  English  criticism  before  that  of  Dryden,  though  Daven- 
ant^^  suggests  a  restriction  as  to  the  choice  of  human  motives 


71.  76.   146. 

72.  Dedication  of  the  ^neis  [1697].  K.  II,   159. 

73.  Bosanquet,  I.  c.  65. 

74.  Cf.  Charles  Lamb's  spontaneous  expression  of  the  same  conclusion.      [On  the 
Artificial  Comedy  of  the  Last  Century. '\ 

Ir,.  DiMcoum  de  la  Tragidie  [1660].     Cf.  Poetics,  xiv. 

76.  I.  c.    [1650].  Sp.  II,   14. 


Materials  Suitable  for  Literature  69 

when  he  explains  that  "the  characters  of  men  whose  passions 
are  to  be  eschewed  I  have  derived  from  tlie  distempers  of  love  or 
ambition,  for  love  and  ambition  are  too  often  the  rating  fevers 
of  great  minds."  This,  however,  he  qualifies  by  the  fact  that 
under  certain  interpretations  ambition  is  a  virtue. 

Another  dictum,  or  rather  collection  of  dicta,  that  appears  in 
Dryden's  theory  is  of  greater  subtlety.  It  has  long  been  de- 
bated and  is  still  debated  whether  writing, — and  for  that  matter 
polite  conversation, — is  improved  by  an  infusion  of  lifihtly  satiri- 
cal malice.^^  To  many  persons,  especially  the  French,  a  character 
or  discourse  devoid  of  such  spice,  is  like  a  salad  in  which  the 
pepper  is  omitted.  It  is  flat,  stale,  and  at  least  unpleasing.  A 
view  similar  to  this  Dryden  expresses  and  reiterates  in  his  Dis- 
course Concerning  the  Origin  and  Progress  of  Satire.  At  first 
glance  it  may  appear  that  he  is  indebted  for  this  opinion  to  the 
French.  It  is  evident,  though,  from  internal  evidence,  that  his 
immediate  source  was  the  Latin  satirists;  though  the  critic's  own 
satirical  disposition,  evidence  of  which  appears  in  his  poetry,  is 
suficient  to  account  for  much  of  it.  Moreover,  there  is  another 
phase  of  satire  that  Dryden  advocates,  which  differentiates  it  in 
character  from  the  French,  the  qualification  that  its  shafts  should 
be  aimed  at  corruptions  and  should  be  used  for  the  ends  of  virtue, 
rather  than  for  a  wanton  pleasure  in  the  inflicting  of  pain.  For 
an  example  of  satire,  he  cites  Ennius,^^  who,  he  says,  took  over 
from  his  predecessors  pleasantry,  venom  and  raillery  "on  par- 
ticular persons,  and  general  vices."  Lucilius^^  later  added  to  the 
traditions  of  Latin  satire  'more  politeness,  and  more  salt." 
Persius,^"  however,  "rather  insulted  over  vice  and  folly,  than 
exposed  them."  Again,^^  "Folly  was  the  proper  quarry  of 
Horace,  and  not  vice."  Again,*^  "Juvenal  is  of  a  more  vigorous 
and  masculine  wit  [than  Horace]  ;  he  gives  me  as  much  pleasure 
as  I  can  bear;  he  fully  satisfies  my  expectation;  he  treats  his 
subject  home:  his  spleen  is  raised,  and  he  raises  mine,"  etc. 


77.  Cf.  Meres'  curious — or  perhaps  facetious — view  on  this  point,  that  satire, 
by  stirring  up  dissensions  between  poets,  keeps  any  group  from  predominating  at 
the  expcn.se  of  general  equilibrium.  ['Sketch  of  English  Literature.  Painting  and 
Music  to  September,   1598."     Reprinted  in  .Vrber's  EnpliMh  Girnrr.  11,    106.] 

78.  A  Discourse  Concerning  the  Oriffinal  and  Progress  of  Satire  [1693].  K. 
II,    60. 

79.  lb.   63.  80.   lb.    71.  81.  lb.  83.  82.   lb.  84. 


70  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticisjn 

Further  on**-'  he  praises  Virfjil  and  Boileau  as  possessing  "the 
most  beautiful,  the  most  noble  kind  of  satire,"  where  the  "ma- 
jesty of  the  lieroic"  is  "finely  mixed"  with  "venom." 

Yet  tlie  satire  must  always  have  a  purpose.  At  least  so  we 
judge  from  his  approval  of  Horace's  motives: 

"In  these  two  books  of  satire,  'tis  the  business  of  Horace  to 
instruct  us  how  to  combat  our  vices,  to  regulate  our  passions,  to 
follow  nature,  to  give  bounds  to  our  desires,  to  distinguish 
betwixt  truth  and  falsehood,  and  betwixt  our  conceptions  of 
things,  and  things  themselves;  to  come  back  from  our  prejudicate 
opinions,  to  understand  exactly  the  principles  and  motives  of  all 
our  actions;  and  to  avoid  the  ridicule  into  which  all  men  neces- 
sarily fall,  who  are  intoxicated  with  those  notions  which  they 
have  received  from  their  masters,  and  which  the}^  obstinately 
retain,  without  examining  whether  or  no  they  be  founded  on 
right  reason." 

For  prose,  specifically  as  prose,  there  is  in  our  period  little 
discussion  of  materials.  In  a  passage  of  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  in  a 
letter  to  his  brother,^*  we  have  a  sort  of  catalogue  of  materials 
for  a  story: 

"A  story  is  either  to  be  considered  as  a  story ;  or  as  a  treatise, 
which,  besides  that,  adds  many  things  for  profit  and  ornament. 

*********** 

In  that  kind  [as  a  story],  you  have  principally  to  note  the 
examples  of  virtue  and  vice,  with  their  good  or  evil  success ;  the 
establishment  or  ruins  of  great  estates,  with  the  causes,  the  time, 
and  circumstances  of  the  laws  then  written  of ;  the  enterings  and 
endings  of  wars;  and  therein,  the  strategems  against  the  enemy, 
and  the  discipline  upon  the  soldier." 

Ben  Jonson  also  has  some  shrewd  observations  as  to  what 
materials  are  suitable  for  art.  Ben  Jonson  in  criticism  most 
frequently  utters  platitudes,  but  it  is  not  uninteresting  to  hear 
him  observe  :**'"'  "If  fyou  write]  to  your  superior,  you  are  bound 
to  measure  him  in  three  farther  points :  first,  your  interest  in 


83.  Jh.    108 

84.  Oct.     18,     l.'iSO.       Printed    in    Ohurton    Collins'    Exxnys    and    Literary    Frag- 
ments, 5. 

85.  Timber,    or   Dincoveriea    [1620-38?]-    Sp.    I,    46. 


Materials  Suitable  for  Literature  71 

him;  secondly,  his  capacity  in  your  letters;  thirdly,  his  leisure 
to  {X'ruse  them." 

This  is  practically  the  whole  story  of  Elizahetlian  and  seven- 
teenth century  ideas  as  to  the  materials  of  art;  with,  however, 
the  exception  of  one  view  yet  to  be  noted.  This  is  the  gcrmina- 
tively  romantic  view  that  any  subject-matter  is  fit  for  art.  In  a 
classical  af?e  it  stands  out  in  striking  contrast  to  its  surroundings. 
There  are  many  suggestions  of  this  germinative  romantic  spirit; 
but  none  is  more  characteristic.  In  Webbe's"®  words  "Poetry  is 
not  debarred  from  any  matter  which  may  be  expressed  by  pen  or 
speech.  Daniel,®"  less  theoretically,  says:  "Suffer  then  the 
world  to  enjoy  that  which  it  knows,  and  what  it  likes." 


86.  \.  c.  Sm.  XXX,  xlvi,  and  I,  249. 

87.  A.  Defenxe  of  Rhyme  [1603?].  Sm.  II.  363. 


CHAPTER  V:    STYLE 


Almost  the  first  note  we  have  in  English  criticism  concerning 
style  strikes  the  note  of  illusion.  Art  must,  according  to  Sir 
Philip  Sidney/  create  the  illusion  of  joy.  Things  naturally  hor- 
rible, cruel  battles,  unnatural  monsters  and  the  rest  are  made 
delightful.  Illusion  in  general  is  probably  what  Webbe^  has  in 
mind  when  he  says,  a  good  poet  should  consider  how  he  is  to  re- 
tain his  reader  or  hearer,  and  again^  that  a  poet,  in  dealing  wdth 
"affects  of  the  mind"  should  be  as  skillful  as"  a  juggler  or  a 
tumbler  and  that  the  reader  by  that  art  should  seem  to  hear  and 
see  the  action.  Or,  as  Dryden*  puts  it,  the  poet  is  to  strive  for 
absolute  dominion  over  the  minds  of  the  spectators.  But  to  do 
this  he  must  have  some  knowledge  of  what  we  would  call  psy- 
chology.^ 

"He  who  would  raise  the  passion  of  a  judicious  audience, 
says  a  learned  critic,"^  must  be  sure  to  take  his  hearers  along  with 
him ;  if  they  be  in  a  calm,  'tis  in  vain  for  him  to  be  in  a  huff :  he 
must  move  them  by  degrees,  and  kindle  with  'em;  otherwise  he 
will  be  in  danger  of  setting  his  owti  heap  of  stubble  on  fire,  and 
of  burning  out  by  himself,  without  warming  the  company  that 
stands  about  him." 

Perhaps  the  neatest  expression  though  of  the  principle  of  illu- 
sion is  that  of  Sir  William  Temple. '^ 

"Whoever  does  not  affect  and  move  the  same  present  passions 
in  you,  that  he  represents  in  others,  and  at  other  times,  raise 
images  about  you,  as  a  conjuror  is  said  to  do  spirits,  transports 


1.  Apolof/u  [1583-95].  Sm.  I,  17.3.  Cf.  citations  from  Sidney  and  Hariiigton. 
Ch.  II,  pp.  31,  45.  Cf.  also  Charles  Lamb's  contention  that  the  stage  should  always 
maintain  conscious  illusion.  See  p.  68.  Cf.  for  the  opposite  view,  Spingarn's  inter- 
pretation of  Scaliger  [Lit.  Crit.  in  the  Renaissance,  95]  :  "An  absolutely  perfect 
illusion  must  prevail;  the  spectator  must  be  moved  by  the  actions  of  the  play  ex- 
actly as  if  they  were  those  of  real  life." 

2.  /.  c.    [1586].   Sm.   I,   296. 

3.  /.'>.  299. 

4.  An  Essay  of  Heroic  Plnys  [1672].  K.  I,   155. 

5.  Prefjice  to   Troilu-t  and  Cressida    [1679].  K.   I.   221. 

6.  Bossu.   Dii  Poihnp  Epiq-iie,  I,   348.     K.  I,   318.      Note. 

7.  Of  Poetry   [1692].  Works,  Vol.   III.      London:    1770,  p.   406. 

—72— 


Style  73 

you  to  the  places  and  to  the  persons  he  describes,  cannot  be 
judged  to  be  a  poet,  though  his  measures  are  never  so  just,  his 
feet  never  so  smooth,  or  his  sounds  never  so  sweet." 

Such  effects  must  seem  spontaneous.  There  must  be  the  art 
to  conceal  the  art.  According  to  Sidney®  a  courtier  is  more  apt 
to  exhibit  good  art  than  a  professor  of  learning.  The  cause,  as 
he  "guesses"  it,  is  that  the  courtier  follows  that  conduct  which 
by  practice  he  finds  to  be  "fittest"  to  nature,  and  therein,  with- 
out knowing  it,  acts  according  to  art.  whereas  the  professor  uses 
art  to  show  art  instead  of  to  hide  it.  Webbe^  goes  a  step  farther, 
and  states  that  the  poet  should  assume  the  affectedly  indifferent 
attitude  that  we  usually  associate  with  Frenchmen.  It  is  the 
attitude  that  Congreve  and  Fielding  affected  when  they  con- 
cealed the  sweat  and  gigantic  labor  their  better  works  must  have 
cost  them,  and  pretended  that  they  merely  dashed  off  a  few 
things  now  and  then,  in  an  off-hand  way,  graciously  giving  them 
to  the  public,  but  with  an  air  of  indifference.  This  attitude,  ac- 
cording to  Webbe,  should  also  appear  in  the  author's  text.  This 
is  repeated,  but  in  clumsier  language,  by  Ben  Jonson,^°  accord- 
ing to  whom  the  writer  should  "use  (as  ladies  do  in  their  attire) 
a  diligent  kind  of  negligence,  and  their  sportive  freedom. ' '  Dry- 
den,^^  in  advocating  the  concealment  of  the  artistic  mechanism, 
soars  to  the  sublimer  heights  of  the  doctrine  of  predestination : 
The  characters  are  moved  "like  the  rational  creatures  of  the 
Almighty  Poet,  who  walk  at  liberty,  in  their  o\vn  opinion,  be- 
cause their  fetters  are  invisible." 

At  the  samt  time  art  must  have  labor  bestowed  upon  it;  it 
must  represent  craftsmanship,  a  warning  which  comes  appro- 
nriately  from  the  pedantic  Webbe.^-  Extempore  verses  are  in 
little  estimation:  and  the  inartificial  ones  are  repelled  as  foolish. 
Cleverness  may  even  exceed  mere  art  and  make  a  perfect  verse, 
if  the  writer  be  heedful  of  good  composition.  This  last,  however, 
is  contradicted  by  the  further  doctrine  that  an  "artificial  poet" 
must  have  nature,  art  and  diligence.    Verses  may  exhibit  lack  of 


8.   I.    c.    [1583  95].    Sm.    I.    203.      Cf.    also   his    objection    to    "Swelling   phrases." 
76.  201. 

9.   1.  c.   [15861.   Sm.   T,   300. 

10.  Timber    [1620-35?]-   Sp.   I,   47. 

11.  Epistle  Dedicatory  of  the  Rival  Ladies  [1664].  K.  I,  4. 

12.  I.  c.    [1586].   Sm.   I,   294-298. 


74  The  RUe  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

tnit'tsniansliip  by  lacking  "art,  facility,  ornament,"  or  they  may 
1)1'  "r-nperfhious.  obscure,  ambitions,  or  needless." 

To  our  modern  ideas  there  must  be  in  art  not  only  craftsraan- 
sliij)  and  the  art  to  conceal  the  craftsmanship,  but  also  the 
spiritual  qualitj^ — the  sine  qua  non  of  art — mood.  Of  this  we 
find,  as  might  almost  be  expected  in  a  severely  classical  age, 
almost  no  recognition.'^  Sir  William  Alexander  in  his  Aiiacri- 
.s/.s."  recognizes  a  "generous  rapture"  in  verse,  but  this  seems 
hardly  more  than  a  superficial  observation  to  the  effect  that 
l)oetry  has  moving  power.  More  regard  is  had  for  the  mood  of 
the  audience.'"'^  One  thing  suits  "pleasant"  persons,  another  sad, 
.'uother  wrathful  and  another  gentle ;  and  it  is  the  business  of  the 
poet  to  take  account  of  this.  ^loreover,  he  must  exhibit  "beauty, 
sweetness  and  affection."  Again :'^  "A  poet  should  delight  in 
all  places  as  well  in  sun  as  shadow. ' ' 

Returning  now  to  the  matter  of  craftsmanship,  we  learn  next 
that  a  poet's  work  should  have  outline.'^  Language  [by  which 
is  probably  meant  details  in  general]  is  but  the  apparel  of  poetry, 
and  must  be  removed  b}^  the  critic  who  wishes  to  discover  the 
"sinews,"  the  strength. 

Moreover,  style  itself,  to  have  value,  must  be  condensed,  must 
exclude  non-essentials.  In  handling  material  there  may  be  "too 
exquisite  diligence."'*'  The  same  writer's  warning'^  against 
superfluities  in  verse  has  just  been  cited.  Ben  Jonson's-"  ex- 
pressions on  the  point  are,  as  usual,  rough  but  vigorous :  A 
writer  should  exhibit  a  style  from  which  you  can  extract  noth- 
ing without  manifest  loss.  "We  should  therefore  speak  what  we 
can  the  nearest  way,  so  as  we  keep  our  gate,  not  leap ;  for  too 
short  may  as  well  be  not  let  into  the  memory,  as  too  long  not  kept 


13.  Cf.  liovi^evrr,  the  delij?htfully  ingenuous  recognition  of  mood  by  Mere  [Quoted, 
Sp.  xcv]  :  "Why  do  you  su])pose  that  Rometimes  in  reading  venses,  they  often  bore 
one  extremely,  although  everything  in  them  appears  fine  and  regular?  I  fancy 
this  must  be  caused  by  a  certain  latent  clumsiness,  which  is  only  perceived  by  senti- 
ment, and  which  thosfv  learned  people  who  have  much  art  and  little  taste  do 
not  feel." 

14.  [16.34].    Sp.    I,    182. 

15.  Webbe,   l.   c.    [1586].   Sm.   I,   292. 

16.  J').    296. 

17.  .•\lc.\ander,   Annrrisii;    [16.14?].    Sp.    I,    182. 

18.  Wcbbe.  /.  r.    [1586].   Sm.   I,  291. 

19.  /'/.   298. 

20.  limber   [1620-35?].    Sp.   I,    39. 


style  75 

ill.  Whatsoever  loses  tlie  {?race  and  clearness  converts  into  a  ri<J- 
dle;  the  obscurity  is  marked,  but  not  the  value.  That  [)erishes 
and  is  past  by,  like  the  pearl  in  the  table.  Our  style  should  be 
like  a  skein  of  silk,  to  be  carried  and  found  by  the  right  thread, 
not  raveled  and  perplexed ;  then  all  is  a  knot,  a  heap." 

Dryden  also  advocates  restraint-^  and  exclusion  of  non-essen- 
tials.-- Such  principles  appear  to  us  as  truisms,  but  are  dis- 
tinctly refreshint?  when  approached  from  the  other,  the  medieval, 
side,  the  preceding  medieval  literature  being  so  often  full  of  non- 
essential details. 

But  a  work  of  art  must  have  somethinof  more  than  good 
craftsmanship,  an  ability  to  conceal  craftsmanship  and  concise- 
ness.   The  material  must  be  unified. 

Of  the  famous  three  writers  in  the  drama  we  have  but  little 
discussion,  until  after  the  Restoration,  when  French  influences 
entered.  This  is  not  surprising,  as  we  know  now^'  that  the  three 
unities  were  developed  in  Renaissance  literature  and  entered 
Western  Europe  chiefly  through  France.  The  Aristotelian 
theory,  to  which,  or  to  the  Latin  versions  of  which,  the  Eliza- 
bethans Seem  to  have  gone  directly,  maintained  only  unity  of 
action.  But  the  Aristotelian  theory  did  support  unity  of  action. 
Consequently  we  have  such  unity-*  mentioned  and  upheld  in  the 
sixteenth  and  early  seventeenth  centuries. 

According  to  Aristotle,-^  a  play  should  have  unity  of  plot ;  it 
should  be  "complete  in  itself,"  that  is,  should  have  be^'inning, 
middle  and  end;  and  should  be  "of  appreciable  magnitude," 
which  means  that  it  should  be  grasped  both  in  part  and  as  a 
whole.  Unity  of  time  and  unity  of  place  are  not  required  by 
Aristotle.  A  remark  of  his  to  the  effect  that  the  action  of  plays 
fills  one  day,  was  simply  an  historical  observation  concerning 
Greek  plays,  not  an  enunciation  of  principle.-''  Ben  Jonson,-* 
in  treating  of  unity  of  action,  merely  quotes  Aristotle.     This 


21.  Bohn,  I.  c.  68. 

22.  A   Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting    [1695].   K.   II.    139. 

23.  See   Spingarn's   chapter   on    "The  Theory   of  the   Drama."      Lit.   Crit.   of   Ihf 
Renaissance. 

24.  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  however,  advocated  all  three  unities.      [Apology.     1583-95. 
Sm.    I,    197-198.] 

25.  Bosanquet,  nistory  of  ^Esthetic,  64.      From  Aristotle's  Poetica. 

26.  Spingarn,   Lit.    Crit.   in  the  Renaissance,   90. 

27.  Saintsbury   II,   203. 


76  The  Rise  of  Classical  Ejiglish  Criticism 

somewhat  vague  sort  of  unity  was,  in  the  hands  of  Sidney,^^  more 
specifically  unity  of  plot.  Plot,  according  to  Sidney,  should  be 
unified  by  the  specific  principle  of  centering  it  about  a  single 
important  act  [our  point  of  climax].  The  view  is  quoted  from 
Horace. 

"By  example,"  says  Sidney,  "this  will  be  best  expressed.  I 
have  a  story  of  young  Polidorus,  delivered  for  safety's  sake,  with 
great  riches,  by  his  father  Priamus  to  Polimnestor,  king  of 
Thrace,  in  the  Trojan  war  time.  He,  after  some  years,  hearing 
the  overthrow  of  Priamus,  for  to  make  the  treasure  his  own, 
murders  the  child ;  the  body  of  the  child  is  taken  up  by  Hecuba ; 
she  the  same  day  finds  a  slight  to  be  revenged  most  cruelly  of  the 
tyrant :  where  now  would  one  of  our  tragedy  writers  begin,  but 
with  the  delivery  of  the  child?  Then  should  he  sail  over  into 
Thrace,  and  so  spend  I  know  not  how  many  years  and  travel 
numbers  of  places.  But  where  doth  Euripides?  Even  with  the 
finding  of  the  body,  leaving  the  rest  to  be  told  by  the  spirit  of 
Polidorus.  This  need  no  further  to  be  enlarged ;  the  dullest  wit 
may  conceive  it." 

Dryden-^  is  equally  specific.  A  plot  must  be  not  merely  one 
man's  life,  but  a  "single  action"  of  it.  And  this  action  must 
"depend"  upon  some  signal  and  long-expected  day.^°  In  pursu- 
ance of  this  plan,  the  long,  slow  development  that  leads  to  a 
climax  must  be  omitted  from  the  action.  At  the  same  time  ven- 
eration for  the  real  forbids  that  it  be  ignored.  Murder,  for  ex- 
ample, does  not,  with  the  responsible  cla.ss  of  persons  who  appear 
in  tragedies,  come  about  as  the  result  of  sudden  emotion  alone, 
but  as  the  climax  to  some  long,  and  generally  slow,  growth  of 
hatred  or  ambition.  Hence  the  familiar  device  by  which  ante- 
cedent events  are  narrated  by  some  actor.  Tliis  Dryden"^ 
mentions,  but  with  the  comment,  the  pertinence  of  which  is  still 
fresh,  that  such  narratives  are  tiresome.    He  even  advises  against 


28.  AvoXo'iV   [1583-95].   Sin.   I,   198. 

29.  Preface   to   Troilns  and  Cressida    [1679].   K.   I,   207.      C/.   also  A   Parallel   of 
Poetry  and  Painting    [169.5].   K.   II,    139,    152. 

30.  EHHoy  of  Dram.   P.    [1668],  Neandpr — Dryden — speaking.     K.   I,   87. 

31.  lb.  62,   Lisideius   [Sedley]    speaking. 


Style  77 

the  choice  of  a  subject  whicli  necessitates  such  narratives." 
Dryden  does  not,  liowever,  while  recognizing'  the  necessity  for  an 
unifying  climax,  seem  to  recogni/e  the  sort  of  double  climax  that 
appears  when  there  is  a  climax  in  tne  third  act  and  what  \^ 
equivalent  to  another  at  the  final  outcome  in  the  fifth.  Accord- 
ing to  him,  every  act  should  lead  higher  in  point  of  intensity." 
until  the  final  solution  comes  as  a  climax  in  the  fifth  act. 

There  must  be,  he  also  observes,  suspense  throughout: 

"When  the  audience  is  brought  into  despair  that  the  business 
can  naturally  be  effected,  then,  and  not  before,  the  discovery  is 
made." 

That  is,  the  plot  must  present  a  situation  that  seems  insoluble. 
Then  at  the  very  end  the  solution  must  come.  But  more,^*  when 
it  comes,  it  must  seem  so  natural  and  inevitable  that  "no  one  of 
the  audience  would  think  the  poet  could  have  missed  it."  If 
there  be  an  underplot,^^  it  is  to  be  subservient  to  the  major  plot, 
and  should  help  its  development. 

Another  sort  of  unity  that  should  be  preserved  is  the  moral  :'* 
"The  poet  is  bound,  and  that  ex  officio,  to  give  his  reader  some 
one  precept  of  moral  virtue,  and  to  caution  him  against  some 
one  particular  vice  or  folly.  Other  virtues,  subordinate  to  the 
first,  may  be  recommended  under  that  chief  head;  and  other 
vices  or  follies  may  be  scourged,  besides  that  which  he  princi- 
pally intends.  But  he  is  chiefly  to  inculcate  one  virtue,  and  in- 
sist on  that." 

Concerning  the  three  unities  as  a  group,  much  has  l>een  writ- 
ten: and  to  them,  probably  undue  importance  has  been  at- 
tributed. In  actual  fact  they  do  not  play  a  great  part  in  Eng- 
lish criticism,  however  great  the  part  they  play  in  English 
classical  drama.  The  part  they  do  play  is,  however,  indicated 
with  a  precision  which  is  deligh.tful  after  the  haziness  and  am- 
biguity of  many  kindred  dicta  of  the  period. 


32.  The  lack  of  vohime  and  the  inadequacy  of  the  provocation  for  the  action 
produced,  which  we  so  often  feel  in  trnRedie.s,  is  due  Inrcelv  to  this  lark  of  preliminary 
development.  How  this  lack  can  be  made  up  and  how  the  tragedy  may  be  made 
to  represent  a  cumulative,  instead  of  a  momentary,  grief,  rage  or  horror,  as  the 
novel   does,   is  still   an   open  problem. 

33.  lb.    88.      Neander — Dryden — speaking. 

34.  lb.  86. 

35.  A  Discourse  Conceriiinif  the  Original  and  Progrett  of  Salirf  [1693].  K. 
II,    102. 

36.  lb.    104. 


78  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

According  to  Sidno}^''"  the  unities  sliould  be  preserved.  But 
:>idn('y  ])raises  Gorboduc  as  the  best  English  play  he  has  seen, 
"c'linibin«r  to  tlie  heiirlit  of  Seneca"  |  !  This  was  the  Latin 
di-ainatist,  whom  the  literati  of  the  Renaissance  so  inexplicably 
admired].  Gorboduc,  however,  is  " defections,"  and  "grieves" 
Sidney,  because  it  is  faulty  in  place  and  time,  time  being,  he 
ihiiiks.  an  Aristotelian  precept.  Jjcu  Jonson''^  advocates  unity 
of  action.  He  also  advocates  unit.y  of  time  [the  one  day  period], 
luit  thinks  there  should  be  time  for  digression  and  episodes.  He 
does  not  formally  require  unity  of  place.  Milton  explicitly  ac- 
cepts the  classical  unity  of  time.''" 

Sir  Robert  Howard,  on  the  other  hand,  at  almost  the  same 
(late,  assumes  the  modern  romantic  attitude.  If  the  dramatist 
departs  from  reality  to  extend  his  play  over  twenty  four  hours 
and  two  rooms,  why  not  as  well  over  a  thousand  years  and  two 
kingdoms.*'^ 

Dryden's  discussion  of  the  unities  appears  first  in  the  Essay 
of  Dramatic  Poesy.  Crites,  there,  one  of  the  speakers  in  the 
dialogue,  speaking  for  the  ancients,  states  the  conventional  doc- 
trine of  the  unities,  but  elucidates  it  somewhat  in  tlie  matter 
of  unit}^  of  place.^^  There  can  be  no  great  change  of  place,  he 
says,  because  the  narrow  limits  of  the  time  will  not  give  the 
characters  time  to  go  to  a  distant  place.    According  to  this  view. 


37.  Apolnrjji  [1583-95].  Sm.  I.  197.  Sidney  was  the  first  English  critic  to 
mention  tlie  three  unities.  His  knowledge  of  them  came  from  Castelvetro  [Spingarn, 
llixl.  iif  Lit.  Crit.  in  the  Renaissance,  290]. 

38.  Spingarn.    Hist,   of  Lit.   (lit.  in    the   Ilcnaissnnre ,    191-192. 

39.  Preface   to   Samson   Agonistes    [1671].    Sp.    I,    209. 

40.  Without  sulscrihing  to  the  exaggeration,  we  ma.v  applaud  the  logic.  Need- 
less to  sa.v  though,  a  play  extended  over  a  thousand  years,  or  a  play  that  began 
in  Germany  and  ended  in  America — unless  the  action  were  of  a  special  and  unusual 
sort  to  justify  the  practice — would  to  us  seem  a  monstrosity.  We  accept  Shake- 
speare's shift  in  Othello  from  Venice  to  Cyprus  somewhat  grudgingly;  but  we.  many 
of  us.  frankly  disapprove  of  William  Vaughn  Moody's  .jump  from  the  western 
desert  to  Boston  in  The  Great  Divide.  So  also  .should  we  somewhat  resent  a  play 
in  which  the  hero  grew  from  youth  to  manhood  in  five  acts.  In  such  matters, 
our  dramatic  taste  is  still  largely  classical. 

41.  [1668].  K.  I,  40.  Lisideius  [7/^.  57],  another  character,  objects  to  English 
tragicomedy  as  violating  unity  of  action,  since  the  audience,  "before  they  are  warm 
in  their  concernments  for  one  part,  are  diverted  to  another;  and  by  that  means 
espou.se  the  interest  of  neither."  But  Neander  [lb.  71],  who  speaks  for  Dryden, 
defends  what  he  rather  vaguely  calls  Engli.sh  "variety."  By  "variety"  he  plainly 
means  profuseness  of  detail:  but  whether  he  will  admit  variety  in  type  is  not  clear. 
He  believes  that  such  "variety,"  though  likely  to  encourage  incoherence,  affords, 
"if   well   ordered,"   greater  pleasure   to  the   audience   than   the   French   lack  of   variety. 


Style  79 

unity  of  place  is  a  mere  detail — one  of  the  practieai  necessities — 
of  unity  of  time.  Xeander's  final  decision  on  place  and  tirn«', 
Dryden's  decision,  is  a  compromise.  It  is  worth  (piotinp  in  full 
as  one  of  the  most  definitely  expressed  of  Dryden's  th(K)ries.*^ 
It  follows  a  (piotation  from  Corneille's  Discours  des  Trois 
Unites  [1660],  warning?  the  reader  that  while  speculative  per- 
sons may  judf?e  severely,  they  would  be  more  lenient  [than  Cor- 
neille]  if  they  tried  to  produce  such  rigid  plays  and  saw  how 
many  beauties  the  rigid  rules  banish  from  the  stage. 

"To  illustrate  a  little  what  he  [Corneille]  has  said:  by  their 
servile  observations  of  the  unities  of  time  and  place,  and  integ- 
rity of  scenes,  they  have  brought  on  themselves  that  dearth  of 
plot,  and  narrowness  of  imagination,  which  may  be  observed  in 
all  their  plays.  How  many  beautiful  accidents  might  naturally 
happen  in  two  or  three  daj^s,  which  cannot  arrive  with  any 
probability  in  the  compass  of  twenty-four  hours?  There  is  time 
to  be  allowed  also  for  maturity  of  design,  which,  amongst  great 
and  prudent  persons,  such  as  are  often  represented  in  tragedy, 
cannot,  with  any  likelihood  of  truth,  be  brought  to  paas  at  so 
short  a  warning.  Further,  b}-  tying  themselves  strictly  to  the 
unity  of  place,  and  unbroken  scenes,  they  are  forced  many  times 
to  omit  some  beauties  which  cannot  be  shown  where  the  act 
began;  but  might,  if  the  scene  were  interrupted,  and  the  stage 
cleared  for  the  persons  to  enter  in  another  place ;  and  therefore 
the  French  poets  are  often  forced  upon  absurdities;  for  if  the 
act  begins  in  a  chamber,  all  the  persons  in  the  play  must  have 
some  business  or  other  to  come  thither,  or  else  they  are  not  to  be 
shown  that  act;  and  sometimes  their  characters  are  very  imfit- 
ting  to  appear  there.  As,  suppose  it  were  the  king's  bed-cham- 
ber ;  yet  the  meanest  man  in  the  tragedy  must  come  and  dispatch 
his  business  there,  rather  than  in  the  lobby  or  courtyard  (which 
is  fitter  for  him),  for  fear  the  stage  should  be  cleared,  and  the 
scenes  broken." 

Later,*"*  when  Dryden  tries  more  specifically  to  defend  his 
limits  of  time,  he  falls  into  inconsistency,  arguing  blindly  that 
twenty-four  hours  are  nearer  three   [whatever  that  may  mean] 


42.  Ih.    7G. 

43.  Defense  of  an   Essay   of  Dram.    V.    [1668].    K.    I,    129. 


80  The  Rise  of  Classical  English   Criticism 

ill. in  four  thousand,  an  obvious  but  meaningless  fact.  Later  he 
implicitly  accepts  Aristotle's  doctrine,  or  what  he  takes  to  be 
sueh.^^  This  view  was  written  a  quarter  of  a  century  later  than 
the  one  just  quoted;  but  the  earlier  pronunciamento  is  not  re- 
tracted. The  inconsistency  may  therefore  be  but  another  of  the 
now  familiar  sort. 

Coming  now  more  specifically  to  the  construction  of  the  acts 
in  a  play,  we  learn  from  Webbe^^  [quoting]  that  a  comedy  with 
more  than  five  acts  is  tedious,  with  less  is  not  "sufficient." 
JMilton**^  thinks  five  acts  sufficient  for  a  play.  Dryden  has  little 
on  the  subject,  but  Corneille's  treatment  of  Aristotle  in  his  Dis- 
cours  de  I'JJtilite  et  des  Parties  du  Poeme  Dramatique  [1660] 
may  enlighten  us  as  to  what  may  w^ell  have  been  the  prevailing 
opinion  in  England.  Aristotle,  according  to  Corneille,  provides 
for  (1)  Qualities  of  extension,  viz.  (a)  prologue,  (b)  episode,  (c) 
exodus,  (d),  chorus  and  (2)  Integral  qualities,  viz.  (a),  subject, 
(b),  customs,  (c)  sentiments,  (d),  diction,  (e),  music,  (f), 
decoration  of  the  theater.*^  He  states  that  in  his  own  usage  the 
prologue  of  Aristotle  has  become  the  first  act.^^  This  act  finishes 
the  introduction  of  all  action,  and  "closes  the  door"  to  new 
motives  of  action.*" 

Jolm  Dennis,^''  chary  of  too  closely  following  the  drama  of  an 
alien  people,  objects  to  the  chorus  as  a  feature  of  Western  Euro- 
pean drama.  The  chorus,  he  observes,  suited  the  religion  and 
temper  of  the  Athenians ;  but  suppose,  he  adds,  a  Queen  Elizabeth 
of  the  stage,  on  hearing  and  lamenting  bad  news,  were  to  behold 
her  ladies  in  ruffs  and  farthingales  all  begin  dancing  a  saraband 
to  a  doleful  ditty. 

Moreover  the  parts  of  a  drama  are  to  be  well  proportioned. 
According  to  Webbe,°^  no  part  of  any  poem  is  to  be  "furnished" 


44.  A  Discoume  Concernin//  the  Original  and  Progress  of  Satire  [1693].  K. 
II,   42. 

45.  I.  c.   11586].  Sm.  I,  293. 

46.  Preface  to  Samson  Agonistes   [1671].   Sp.  I,   209. 

47.  Cf.  here  Phillips'  predication  to  a  good  epic  of  diction,  style,  imagery,  plot, 
elevation  of  fancy,  the  amjjlitude  of  the  subject,  and  the  justice  and  impartiality 
of  the  poet.      [Sjj.   xxxii.] 

48.  IHscours  des   Trots    Unites    [1660]. 

49.  Cf.  however,  Dryden's  admiration  of  The  Silent  Woman  because  variety 
is  added  by  the  introduction  of  new  characters  in  the  second  ana  third  acts.  [Essay 
of  Dram.  P.   I(i68.      Neander — Dryden — speaking.   K.   I,   88.] 

50.  The  Impnrlial  Critic   [1693].   Sp.   Ill,   148  et  seq. 

51.  I.  c.    [1586].   Sm.   I,  291. 


style  81 

better  than  another.  Also''*  '"J'he  he^iiiiiing  imist  not  he  fool- 
ishly handled,  that  is,  strangely  or  too  long."  Dryden  is  more 
specific  when  he  says^'  [though  this,  being  put  into  the  mouth  of 
Crites,  in  the  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy,  speaking  for  the  ancients, 
must  be  taken  as  merely  tentative],  that  the  whole  time  of  the 
drama  occupied  with  action  should  be  subdivided  nearly  evenly 
between  the  five  acts. 

"For  it  is  unnatural  that  one  act,  which  being  spoken  or 
written  is  not  longer  than  the  rest  should  be  supposed  longer 
by  the  audience;  'tis  therefore  the  poet's  duty,  to  take  care 
that  no  act  should  be  imagined  to  exceed  the  time  in  which  it  is 
represented  on  the  stage;  and  that  the  intervals  and  inequalities 
of  time  be  supposed  to  fall  out  between  the  acts." 

Dryden  also  has  some  observations  on  the  proportioning  of 
action : 

^*"Too  many  accidents,  as  I  have  said,  encumber  the  poet,  as 
much  as  the  arms  of  Saul  did  David ;  for  the  variety  of  passions 
which  they  produce  are  ever  crossing  and  justling  each  other  out 
of  the  way.  He  who  treats  of  joy  and  grief  together  is  in  a  fair 
way  of  causing  neither  of  those  effects." 
Again : 

^^"Some  parts  of  a  poem  require  to  be  amply  written,  and  with 
all  the  force  and  elegance  of  words;  others  must  be  cast  into 
shadows,  that  is,  passed  over  in  silence,  or  but  faintly  touched." 

Dryden  has  similar  ideas  in  his  Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Paint- 
ing, concerning  the  proportionate  importance  and  grouping  of 
the  characters.  His  ideas  on  painting  are  from  Dn  Fresnoy's 
De  Arte  Graphica. 

-'^"The  principal  figure  of  the  subject  ynust  appear  in  the 
midst  of  the  picture,  under  the  principal  light,  to  distinguish  it 
from  the  rest,  which  are  only  its  attendants.  Thus,  in  a  tragedy, 
or  an  epic  poem,  the  hero  of  the  piece  must  be  advanced  foremost 
to  the  view  of  the  reader,  or  spectator:  he  must  outshine  the  rest 
of  all  the  characters ;  he  must  appear  the  prince  of  them,  like  the 
sun  in  the  Copernican  system,  encompassed  with  the  less  noble 


52.  7b.    293. 

53.  E.i«a!/  of  Dram.   P.    [1668].   K.   I.   39. 

54.  Preface  to   Troilus  and  Cressida    [1679].   K.   T.   223. 

55.  A   ParaUel  of  Poetry  and  Paintivg  [1695).  K.   II,   151. 

56.  lb.    142. 


82  The  Rise  of  Classical  Eiiglish  Criticism 

(uanels :  because  the  hero  is  the  center  of  the  main  action  ;  all  the 
lines  from  the  circumference  tend  to  him  alone:  he  is  the  chief 
object  of  pit}'  in  the  drama,  and  of  admiration  in  the  epic  poem." 
■''''The  figures  of  the  groups  must  not  Ite  all  on  a  side,  that 
is,  with  their  face  and  bodies  all  turned  the  same  way;  hut  must 
contrast  each  other  hy  their  several  positions.  Thus  in  a  play, 
some  characters  must  be  raised,  to  oppose  others,  and  to  set  them 
off  the  better;  according  to  the  old  maxim,  contraria  juxta  se 
posita  magis  elucescuni.  Thus,  in  The  Scornful  Lady,  the 
usurer  is  set  to  confront  the  prodigal;  thus,  in  my  Tyrannic 
Love,  the  atheist  Maximin  is  opposed  to  the  character  of  St. 
Catherine. ' ' 

Another  fundamental  principle  in  the  drama  is  the  use  of 
evident  and  probable  causes  for  all  effects.  Corneille  quotes 
Aristotle  to  the  effect  that  events  should  have  verisimilitude 
and  be  necessary,^^  which  he  explains  further  in  his  Discours  des 
Trois  Unites  [1660]  by  observing  that  according  to  Aristotle 
there  is  great  difference  between  events  that  merely  follow  other 
events,  and  events  caused  by  them.  The  idea  that  every  effect 
should  have  evident  cause  is^^  repeated  by  Dryden.  According 
to  Dryden^°  the  audience  must  be  satisfied  that  in  a  plot  ' '  Every 
cause  was  powerful  enough  to  produce  the  effect  it  had;  and 
that  the  whole  chain  of  them  was  with  such  due  order  linked 
together,  that  the  first  accident  would  naturally  beget  the  second, 
till  the}^  all  rendered  the  conclusion  necessary," 

A  special  application  of  the  same  principle  is  made  by 
Lisideius  in  the  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy. ^'^  Neander,  in  replj^- 
ing,  grants  a  great  part  of  the  preceding  contentions.  As 
Lisideius'  remark  precedes  Neander 's  almost  immediately,  it 
may  well  be  a  part  of  the  conceded  matter : 

"It  shows  little  art  in  the  conclusion  of  a  dramatic  poem, 
when  they  who  have  hindered  the  felicity  during  the  four  acts, 


57.  Ih.   147. 

58.  Discours  de  la  Tragid/ie   [1660]. 

59.  Cf.  also  William  Wotton,  Rfflrrfions  upon  Ancient  and  Modern  Learning 
[1694].   Sp.   Ill,   214. 

60.  Epixtle  Dedicatory  of  the.  Rival  Ladies   [1664].  K.  I,  2. 

61.  [1668].  K.  I,  66.  C/.  al.so  Ilobbes'  condemnation  of  disproportion  between 
persons  and  actions  [Answer  to  Davenant's  Preface  to  Gondibert.  1650].  Cf.  also 
Jeremy  Collier,   Immorality  of  the  English  Stage    [1698],   Sp.   Ill,   278. 


Style  83 

desist  from  it  in  the  fifth,  without  some  powerful  i-ausc  to  takf 
them  off;  and  though  I  deny  not  but  such  reasons  may  be 
found,  yet  it  is  a  path  that  is  cautiously  to  be  trod,  and  the  poet 
is  to  be  sure  that  he  convinces  the  audience  that  the  motive  is 
strong  enough.  As  for  example,  the  conversion  of  the  Usurer  in 
Tine  Scornful  Lady,  seems  to  me  a  little  forced;  for,  being  a 
Usurer,  which  implies  a  lover  of  money  to  the  highest  degree  of 
covetousness  (and  such  the  poet  has  represented  him),  the  ac- 
count he  gives  for  the  sudden  change  is,  that  he  has  been  duped 
by  the  wild  young  fellow,  which  in  reason  might  render  him  more 
wary  another  time,  and  make  him  punish  himself  with  harder 
fare  and  coarser  clothes,  to  get  it  up  again;  but  that  he  should 
look  on  it  as  a  judgment,  and  so  repent,  we  may  expect  to  hear 
of  in  a  sermon,  but  I  should  never  endure  it  in  a  play." 

Another  important  point  is  that  the  necessity  or  probability 
should  extend  to  the  entrances  and  exits.  The  passage  is  trans- 
lated by  Dryden  and  put  into  the  mouth  of  Lisideius  as 
speaker  in  the  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy.^"^  The  meaning  of  the 
word  "insist"  in  the  first  line  is  ambiguous;  but  the  meaning  is 
plainly,  I  accept  these  views,  but  will  not  dwell  upon  them. 
Moreover,  the  opinions  are  probably  Dryden 's.  Though  they  are 
put  into  the  mouth  of  an  opposing  arguer,  Neander  the  next 
speaker  explicitly  accepts  "a  great  part"  of  the  preceding  con- 
tentions. 

"Neither  will  I  insist  on  the  care  they  take,  that  no  person 
after  his  first  entrance  shall  ever  appear,  but  the  business  which 
brings  hira  upon  the  stage  shall  be  evident;  which,  if  observed, 
must  needs  render  all  the  events  in  the  play  more  natural ;  for 
there  you  see  the  probability  of  every  accident,  in  the  cause  that 
produced  it;  and  that  which  appears  chance  in  the  play,  will 
seem  so  reasonable  to  you,  that  you  will  there  find  it  almast 
necessary:  so  that  in  the  exits  of  the  actors  you  have  a  clear 
account  of  their  purpose  and  design  in  the  next  entrance  (though, 
if  the  scene  be  well  wrought,  the  event  will  commonly  deceive 
you),  for  there  is  nothing  so  absurd,  says  Corneille,  as  for  an 
actor  to  leave  the  stage,  only  because  he  has  no  more  to  say." 

Corneille  adds^^  to  the  theory  of  cause  and  effect  the  observa- 


62.  [1668].   K.   I,   66.     Cf.  here  Corneille's  liaixon   de»  seme: 

63.  fltACOi'M  df  la  Tragedif    [1660]. 


84  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

lion  that  it  pleases  the  audience  [a  fact  he  sometimes  admits  into 
his  critical  theory]  to  have  a  good  man  come  to  a  good  end,  an 
evil  to  an  evil  end.  Sometimes,  thoui?h,  he  adds,  a  man  is  good, 
but  by  fault  or  human  foible  falls  into  an  evil  that  he  does  not 
deserve.  This  famous  doctrine  seems  to  be  a  somewhat  crudely 
simple  form  of  the  "poetic  justice"®*  of  Rymer.  The  relation 
of  acts  to  motives  has  also,  according  to  Dryden,®^  a  religious 
purpose.  We  cannot  be  grieved  by  the  miseries  of  the  thoroughly 
wicked.  On  the  other  hand,  to  bring  miseries  upon  a  wholly  good 
person  would  produce  impious  thoughts  in  the  audience :  ' '  They 
would  accuse  the  heavens  of  injustice."  The  chief  character  of 
the  heroic  drama  should  have  evils  enough  to  excuse  his  downfall, 
but  be  good  enough  to  arouse  our  sympathy. 

At  the  same  time  the  motives  are  to  have  spontaneity,®*'  for 
"The  motives  which  are  studied  are  never  so  natural  as  those 
which  break  out  in  the  height  of  a  real  passion."  These  passions 
are,  moreover,®^  to  be  dra\^^l  with  regard  to  the  persons  who 
exhibit  them. 

Besides  motives,  manners  are  to  be  considered.  Manners,  ac- 
cording to  Dryden,®^  must  be,  first,  apparent.  Every  person 
must  have  some  inclination  [the  "humor"  of  Ben  Jonson] 
which  shows  in  action  and  discourse:  second,  they  must  agree 
with  the  person's  "age,  sex,  dignity,  and  the  other  general 
heads  of  manners";  for  example,  a  king  must  exhibit  majesty, 
magnanimity,  and  jealousy  of  power:  third,  manners  must,  in 
the  case  of  an  historical  character,  be  consistent  with  known 
facts.  In  addition  to  these  qualities,  the  manners  must  have 
consistency  in  general.  IManners  being  the  visible  structure  of 
the  pla3',  above  ground,  as  Dryden  says,  in  contradistinction  to  the 
plot  which  is  the  concealed  foundation  below  ground,  manners 
are  of  great  imnortance.®" 


64.  Sp.  Ixxiii. 

65.  A   ParaUel  of  Poetry  and  Painting   [169.5].   K.   II,   126. 

66.  A   Parallel  of  Poetry  and  Painting   [1695].   K.   II,    145. 

67.  lb.    146. 

68.  Dedication  of  the  JEnein  [1697].  K.  I,  213-215.  Cf.  also  .Jeremy  Collier, 
Jmmorulitu    of   the    Englixh    Stage    [1698].    Sp.    Ill,    282. 

69.  To  this  conception  of  manners  Corneille  [Dixcours  des  Trois  Unites.  1660] 
adds  a  word  as  to  habits  or  customs,  to  the  effect  that  they  explain  how  a  man 
has  hjcome  evil  or  good,  witty  or  stupid,  timid  or  brave^  constant  or  irresolute,  of 
good   or   evil    politics. 


style  85 

Another  important  point  in  connection  uilli  dnirnatic  tech- 
nique is  brought  up  by  Ryiner/"  the  arch  realisi,  incidentally  one 
of  the  best  critics  of  his  or  any  age.  The  substance  of  his  criti- 
cism is  that  intellijjible  words  do  not  help,  but  retard,  realistic 
action.  If  the  words  be  unintelligible,  they  may  serve  "to  dis- 
tinguish, and,  as  it  were,  beat  time  to  the  action,"  like  the  drone 
of  a  bagpipe ;  though,  adds  Rymer,  for  such  purposes  Polish  or 
Spanish  words  or  inarticulate  sounds  are  as  good  as  any  others, 
in  fact  better.  "Known  language"  clogs  or  encumbers  the 
operation.  But  where  no  words  interfere  to  spoil  the  concept, 
every  one  interprets  as  he  likes  best.^^  The  last  phra.se  is  not 
very  intelligible,  but  the  meaning  is  well  brought  out  by  an 
illustration.  Speaking  of  Othello,  he  says:  "Would  not  a  rap  at 
the  door  better  express  lago's  meaning  [in  Othello]  than 

'Call  aloud, 
lago. — Do,  with  like  timorous  accent  and  dire  yell 
As  when,  by  night  and  negligence,  the  fire 
Is  spied  in  populous  cities?' 
For  What  ship?    Who  is  arrived?  the  answer  is: 
'  'Tis  one  lago,  ancient  to  the  general. 
He  has  had  most  favorable  and  happy  speed ; 
Tempests  themselves,  high  seas,  and  howling  winds, 
The  guttered  rocks,  and  congregated  sands. 
Traitors  ensteeped  to  clog  the  guiltless  keel, 
As  having  sense  of  beauty,  do  omit 
Tiieir  common  natures,  letting  go  safely  by 
The  divine  Desdemona.' 
Is  this  the  language  of  the  exchange  or  the  ensuring  office?" 
Dryden  has  the  same  idea.    Lovers  say  little  when  they  see 
one  another.     "Any  sudden  gust  of  passion,"  says  Eugenius,,'- 
in  the  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy,"  (as  an  exta.sy  of  love  in  an 
unexpected  meeting)  cannot  better  be  expressed  than  in  a  word 
and  a  sigh,  breaking  one  another."     Then  he  adds,  .somewhat 


70.  .4    Shnrt   View  of  Tragedy    [1693].   Sp.   II,   211,   239. 

71.  Cf.  in  this  coniu'ction,  Mr.  Gordon  Craig's  theory,  first  advanced  in  his 
journal  The  Mask,  that  the  drama  .should  be  divorced  from  literature  and  made  into 
a  separate  type  of  art,  since  literature  deals  with  sentence  style;  and  a  drama,  to 
be  real,  should  bring  in  only  the  fragmentary  phrases  a  person  might  really  "se 
under  stress  of  emotion  or  excitement,  or  in  other  dramatic  situations. 

72.  [1668].   K.   I,   54. 


86  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

superthiously :  "Nature  is  dumb  on  such  occasions;  and  to  make 
her  speak,  would  be  to  represent  her  unlike  herself."  But  again, 
there  are,  he  adds,  a  thousand  other  affairs  of  lovers  when  they 
ought  to  talk,  such  as  "jealousies,  complaints,  contrivances,  and 
the  like. ' '  Not  to  talk  on  these  occasions  would  be  "to  be  want- 
ing to  their  own  love  and  to  the  expectation  of  the  audience," 
the  last  because  the  audience  wishes  to  see  the  movements  of 
their  minds.  Similarly^^  "It  is  unnatural  for  any  one  in  a  gust 
of  passion  to  speak  long  together,  or  for  another  in  the  same 
condition  to  suffer  him,  without  interruption."  Yet  again:''* 
"No  man  is  at  leisure  to  make  sentences  and  similes,  when  his 
soul  is  in  an  agony." 

At  the  same  time  repartee  is  one  of  the  chief  graces  of 
comedy."''  Wit  needs  words ;  wit  is  "  a  propriety  of  thoughts  and 
words.  "^^  A  more  remarkable  expression  is  quoted  by  Dryden 
from  Rapin  •?'' 

"It  is  not  the  admirable  intrigue,  the  surprising  events,  and 
the  extraordinary  incidents,  that  make  the  beauty  of  a  tragedy; 
it  is  the  discourses,  when  they  are  natural  and  passionate. ' ' 

Apropos  of  dialogue,  Webbe  's  striking,  but  not  remarkable,  cau- 
tion is  to  be  noted  •?^  ' '  Let  not  more  persons  speak  together  than 
four  for  avoiding  confusion." 

The  ideas  of  epic  poetry  seem  to  have  been  largely  a  develop- 
ment of  the  theory  of  the  drama.  In  Davenant's  Preface  to 
Gondii  erf '^  this  tlieory  is  specifically  elaborated.  The  pleasure 
of  reading  a  completely  and  scientifically  stated  theory  is  so  rare 
in  the  period  v\^e  are  considering,  that  I  shall  quote  Davenant's 
theory  in  full.  In  modelin-z'  his  poom  after  the  drama  he  lias 
not  only  observed  the  "symmetry"  of  the  drama  "proportioning 
five  books  to  five  acts  and  cantos  to  scenes,  the  scenes  having 
their  number  ever  governed  by  occasion, — but  all  the  shadow- 


73.  lb.,  Neander  speaking,  72. 

74.  Preface  to  Troilus  and  Grensida  [1679].  K.  I,  223.  See  also  Preface  to  the 
Fables   [1700].  K.  II,  2.57. 

7.5.   Essay  of  Dram.  P.    [1668],   Neander  speaking.  K.   I,   72. 

76.  Preface  to  Albion  and  Alhnnius  [1685].  K.  I,  270.  Cf.  Sidney  Smith's 
similar  definition  of  wit, — as  distinct  from  humor, — which  involves  a  perception  of 
incongruit.v  [On  Wit  and  Humor'i. 

77.  II cads  of  an  Ansvter  to  Rymer.      Bohn,   I.  c,  108. 

78.  I.  c.    [1.586].   Sm.  I,  293. 

79.  [1650].  Sp.  II,  17.  Aristotle  sa.vs  that  some  of  the  parts  of  epic  and 
tragedy  are  the  same    [Poetics,  v,   xxiii,  xxiv]. 


style  87 

ings,  liappy  strokes,  secret  graces,  aud  even  the  drapery,  which 
together  make  the  second  beauty,  I  have,  I  hope,  exactly  fol- 
lowed ;  and  those  compositions  of  second  beauty  I  observe  in  the 
drama  to  be  the  imder-walks,  interweaving,  or  correspondence 
of  lesser  design  in  scenes,  not  the  great  motion  of  the  main  plot 
and  coherence  of  the  acts. 

"The  first  act  is  the  general  preparative,  by  rendering  the 
chiefest  characters  of  persons,  and  ending  with  something  that 
looks  like  an  obscure  promise  of  design.  The  second  begins  with 
an  introducement  of  new  persons,  so  finishes  all  the  characters, 
and  ends  wath  some  little  performance  of  that  design  which  was 
promised  at  the  parting  of  the  first  act.  The  third  makes  a 
visible  correspondence  in  the  under- walks,  or  lesser  intrigues,  of 
persons,  and  ends  with  an  ample  turn  of  the  main  design  and 
expectation  of  a  view.  The  fourth,  ever  having  occasion  to  be  the 
longest,  gives  a  notorious  turn  to  all  the  under-walks,  and  a 
counterturn  to  that  main  design  which  changed  in  the  third. 
The  fifth  begins  with  an  entire  diversion  of  the  main  and  de- 
pendent plots,  then  makes  the  general  correspondence  of  the 
persons  more  discemable,  and  ends  with  an  easy  untying  of 
those  particular  knots  which  made  a  contexture  of  the  whole, 
leaving  such  satisfaction  of  probabilities  with  the  spectator  as 
may  persuade  him  that  neither  fortune  in  the  fate  of  the  persons, 
nor  the  writer  in  the  representment,  have  been  unntaural  or 
exorbitant.  To  these  Meanders  of  the  English  stage  I  have  cut 
out  the  walks  of  my  poem,  which  in  this  description  may  seem 
intricate  and  tedious,  but  will,  I  hope,  when  men  take  pains  to 
visit  what  they  have  heard  described,  appear  to  them  as  pleasant 
as  a  summer  passage  on  a  crooked  river,  wliere  going  about  and 
turning  back  is  as  delightful  as  the  delay  of  parting  lovers. ' ' 

Following  this  comes  a  brief  sketch  of  the  purpose  of  the 
"Argument"  prefixed  to  the  individual  canto.  The  argument 
should  contain  hints  of  the  design  of  the  poem,  hut  should  men- 
tion ratlier  persons  than  actions,  so  as  not  to  anticipate  the 
subject. 

Hobbes,^"  in  his  Answer  to  Darcnanf,  admits  that  the  figure 
[organization]  of  an  epic  poem  and  a  tragedy  ought  to  be  the 


80.    [1650].   Sp.  IT,  55. 


88  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

same.  The  idea  of  unity,  corresponding  roughly  to  the  drama- 
tist's unity  of  action,  is  the  conventional  rhetorician's  unity,"' 
Dryden  goes,  however,  a  bit  further.^-  The  episodes  or  unaer- 
actions  of  an  heroic  poem  must  be  "either  sq  necessary,  that, 
without  them,  the  poem  must  be  imperfect,  or  so  convenient,  that 
no  others  can  be  imagined  more  suitable  to  the  place  in  which 
they  are. ' ' 

In  the  treatment  of  satire  there  is  a  curious  modification  of 
this.  After  certain  conventional  observations,  Dryden^^  says,  of 
it: 

"If  other  vices  occur  in  the  management  of  the  chief,  they 
sliould  only  be  transienth^  lashed,  and  not  be  insisted  on,  so  as  to 
make  the  design  double. ' ' 

In  the  matter  of  general  treatment  in  an  heroic  poem,  Dryden 
quotes  Segrais'  preface  to  his  translation  of  the  JEneid,^*  to  the 
effect  that  the  style  of  the  heroic  poem  should  be  more  lofty  than 
that  of  the  drama.  The  reason  is  that  the  actor  must  speak 
plainly,  for  the  words  are  to  be  "taken  flying"  by  the  ear, 
whereas  in  reading  a  poem  we  have  ' '  leisure  to  digest. ' ' 

The  discussion,  in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries 
of  sentence  style  and  choice  of  words,  like  much  of  the  writing, 
is  somewhat  general  in  substance,  but  not  lacking  in  explicitness. 
We  have,  first  in  point  of  generalit3^  the  doctrine  of  what  the 
rhetorician  to-da}''  calls  tone,  in  early  criticism  frequentl}^  called, 
somewhat  obscurely,  by  the  term  decorum,  which  also  carried  the 
idea  of  many  other  things  as  well. 

Webbe^'^  believes  in  such  decorum  of  words,  thinking  that  big 
matters  should  be  treated  with  ' '  boisterous  words. '  '^*^  Moreover 
the  speech  of  the  characters  in  a  poem  is  to  accord  Avith  the 
dignity,  age,  sex,  fortune,  condition,  place,  country,  and  the  like, 


81.  C/.   for  example,   Sm.  xxxiv;   I,   131. 

82.  Dedication    to    the   JEnein    [1697].    K.    II,    154,    155.      Cf.    also    Sir    Richard 
Blackmore,    Preface  to  Prince  Arthur    [1695].    Sp.   Ill,    238. 

83.  A     Discourse    Concerning    the    Orifjiyial    and    Progress    of    Satire    [1693].    K. 
II,   102. 

84.  Dedication  of  the  2Eneis  [1697].  K.  II,   165. 

85.  I.   c.    [1586].   Sm.   I,   291,   292. 

86.  Note    the    finer    and    more    courtly    Puttenham's    .<?trictiire    on    this,    where    he 
warns  the  reader  against  inflated  language  for  stately  effects.   \_L  c-t  173.] 


Style  89 

of  eacli  person.  Wlietstoni'  urges  the  preservation  of  eharacter  iu 
Ki)eeches  in  comedy :"" 

"Grave  old  men  should  instruct,  youn^  men  shouhl  sliow  tin- 
imperfections  of  youth,  strumpets  sliould  he  lascivious,  hoys  un- 
liappy,  'ind  clowns  should  speak  disorderly." 

Puttenham,  on  this  point,**^  is  singularly  pleasing.  Style,  ac- 
cording to  him,  must  reflect  the  man.  A  grave  man  has  a  grave 
style,  a  vehement  man  a  vehement  style,  and  so  on.  Yet  style  is 
also  conformable  to  the  subject  matter:  though  it  must  be  remem- 
bered that  a  writer  chooses  subjectt  matter  congenial  to  him  and  so 
congenial  to  his  &\y\e.  A  high  minded  man  writes  by  taste  of 
lofty  matters,  a  base  of  base,  and  so  on.  Style  may  be  regarded 
as  high,  mean  or  base  style,**^  though  other  qualities  also  appear 
as  the  plain,  obscure,  rough,  smooth,  facile,  hard,  plentiful,  bar- 
ren, rude,  eloquent,  strong,  feeble,  vehement,  cold.  The  high, 
mean,  and  base  styles  are  to  be  used  for  high  matters  and  great 
men,  mean  matters  and  mean  men  but  "of  the  civiler  and  better 
sort,"  and  low  matters  of  artificers,  serving  men,  and  the  like, 
respectively.  Hymns,  histories,  and  tragedies  are  to  be  in  the 
high  style,  comedies  and  interludes  and  poetry  of  loves  "and 
such  like"  in  mean  style,^"  and  eclogues  and  pastoral  poems  in 
the  low  style.  Certain  phrases  and  figures  are  common  to  all 
three  styles,  some  only  to  one.  For  example,  puffed  up  or 
affected  phrases  are  ridiculous  in  the  high  style,  also  dark  and 
unaccustomed  words,  or  rustic  and  homely  [home-like]  words,  or 
sentences  that  are  too  merry  and  light  or  infamous  and  unshame- 
faced.  Such  phrases  are  unbecoming  to  princes  or  to  those  who 
write  of  princes  or  of  great  estates  or  of  grave  and  weighty  mat- 
ters. Set  speeches,  such  as  those  in  Parliament,  he  treats  more 
specifically.^^  They  need  a  style  that  is  more  than  conversa- 
tional; they  need  (1)  language,  (2)  style,  (3)  figures.  Ben 
Jonson,  in  his  somewhat  platitudinous  fashion,  echoes  the  phrase, 
Style  shows  the  man,^-  which  is  merely  another  and  vaguer  way 

87.  Of  Comedy  [1578].  Sm.  I,  60.  Cf.  Collier,  Immorality  of  Ike  SngHsk 
Stage   [1698].  Sp.  III.  282. 

88.  I.   c.    [1589].    Sm.   II,    144-162. 

89.  Saintsbury,  II,  186.  Cf.  also  Ascham,  Schoolmattrr  (1570).  Sm. 
I,    23-25. 

90.  Note  especially  Putfenham's  apt  anecdote  on  p.    144. 

91.  Saintsbury   II,    85. 

92.  Saintsbury   II,  202.      Timber   [1620  35?].   Sp.  I.  41. 


90  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

of  referring  to  tlie  same  quality,  tone.  Milton  satirizes  the  poet 
niio  cannot  maintain  his  flight,  but  drops  into  frigidity.^^ 
Drummond  attacks  those  who  make  their  characters  speak  as 
Avell  as  themselves.^*  Phillips^^  also  observes  tone,  and  specifies 
that  a  poem  "be  not  inflate  or  jingling  with  an  empty  noise  of 
words,  nor  creepingly  low  and  insipid,  but  of  a  majesty  suitable 
to  the  grandeur  of  the  subject."  Nor  must  the  poet  be  afraid  of 
"vulgarly  unknown"  terms  for  fear  of  frightening  the  ladies. 
The  highest  stj'le,  according  to  the  same  writer,  is  "not  ramping, 
but  passionately  sedate  and  moving. ' '  Cowley^®  adds  a  pleasing 
observation  on  tone:  "The  truth  is,  for  a  man  to  write  well,  it  is 
necessary  to  be  in  a  good  humor. ' ' 

In  Dryden  also  we  have  tiie  conception  of  tone.  Sincerity 
plays  its  part.^^  In  wit  the  tone  should  be  fixed  by  a  study  of  the 
character  who  speaks  it : 

°^"Low  comedy  especiallj^  requires,  on  the  writer's  part,  much 
of  conversation  with  the  vulgar,  and  much  of  ill  nature  in  the 
observation  of  their  follies." 

This  yAi  varies  with  persons : 

"^"A  witty  coward,  and  a  witty  brave,  must  speak  differ- 
entlj'."  Dryden 's  successor,  Congreve,"'°  has  some  pointed  obser- 
vations on  the  subject.  He  defines  humor  as  Ben  Jonson  did, 
then  observes : 

"A  character  of  a  splenetic  and  peevish  humor  should  have 
a  satirical  wit.  A  jolly  and  sanguine  humor  should  have  a  face- 
tious wit.  The  former  should  speak  positively ;  the  latter,  care- 
lessly :  for  the  former  observes  and  shows  things  as  they  are ; 
the  latter  rather  overlooks  nature,  and  speaks  things  as  he  would 
have  them,  and  his  wit  and  humor  have  both  of  them  a  less  alloj^ 
of  judgment  than  the  others." 

Satire  has  a  different  tone  :^°^ 


93.  Apology  for  Smectymnuus   [1642].  Sp.   I,   204. 

94.  Ben  Jonson's  Conversations  with  Drummond    [1619].   Sp.   I,   210,   212,  215 

95.  Preface  to  Theatrum  Poetarum  [1675].  Sp.  II,  269,  270. 

96.  Preface  to  Poems   [1656].  Sp.  II,  81. 

97.  A    Discourse    Concerning    the    Original    and    Progress    of    Satire    [1693].    K. 
11,  77. 

98.  Preface  to  An  Evening's  Love    [1671].   K.   I,    135. 

99.  lb.   140. 

100.  Concerning   Uumor   in   Comedy    [1695].    Sp.    Ill,    244,    246. 

101.  A    Discourse   Concerning   the    Original   and   Progress   of  Satire    [1693].    K. 
II,   92,   93. 


Siylf  91 

"The  nicest  and  most  delicate  touches  of  satire  consist  in  fine 
raillery."  Yet  this  fineness  of  raillery  is  not  offensive.  "A 
witty  man  is  tickled  while  he  is  hurt  in  this  manner,  and  a  fool 
feels  it  not."  At  the  same  time  it  is  to  be  observed  that*"  "To 
entertain  an  audience  perpetually  with  humor,  is  to  carry  them 
from  the  conversation  of  gentlemen."  Perhaps  the  most  sane 
observation  on  wit  in  general  is  that  of  Sir  William  Temple  r*"' 
Besides  the  "heat  of  invention  and  liveliness  of  wit,"  there  must 
be  "coldness  of  good  sense  and  soundness  of  judgment." 

"Without  the  forces  of  wit,  all  poetry  is  flat  and  languish- 
ing ;  without  the  succors  of  judgment,  it  is  wild  and  extravagant. 
The  true  wit  of  poesy  is,  that  such  contraries  must  meet  to  com- 
pose it,  a  genius  both  penetrating  and  solid ;  in  expression  both 
delicacy  and  force ;  and  the  frame  or  fabric  of  a  true  poem  must 
have  something  both  sublime  and  just,  amazing  and  agreeable." 

Another  important  matter  in  style  is  conciseness.  King 
James's  dictum  is  interesting  on  this  point,  both  for  its  plainness 
and  for  its  character  as  the  dictum  of  a  poet  :^°* 

"You  must  also  take  heed  to  frame  your  words  and  sentences 
according  to  the  matter:  As  in  flyting*"^  and  invectives  your 
words  to  be  cut  short,  and  vigorous^"'.  For  those  which  are  cut 
short,  I  mean  by  such  words  as  these:  I'se  ne'er  care,  for,  I  shall 
never  care,  if  your  subject  were  of  love  or  tragedies.  Because  in 
them  your  words  must  be  drawn  long,  which  in  flyting  must  be 
short."  Ben  Jonson  also  observes  the  value  of  brevity,'"^  and 
adds, — speaking  of  letters  to  a  superior, — that  brevity  is  well 
obtained  by  avoiding  idle  compliments,  prefaces,  protestations, 
parentheses,  superfluous  circuit  of  figures,  and  digressions.  In 
such  a  letter  the  conjunctions  also  may  be  freely  omitted. 

There  is  also  a  considerable  amount  of  discussion  in  this 
period  of  figures  of  speech.  Sir  Philip  Sidney  extols  the  figure 
of  synecdoche,  thereby  showing  his  appreciation  of  the  concrete, 


102.  Preface  to  An   Evening's  Lore    [1671],   K.   I,    140. 

103.  Of  Poetry.      Works,   Vol.   III.      London,    1877.   p.   402. 

104.  A   Short  Treatise  on   Ver/ie   [1584].   Sm.   I,  217. 

105.  Poetic   invective.      Sm.    I,    Note.   p.    406. 

106.  "Hurland  ouer  Iieuch."      Sm.   Ih.      "Dnshinc    (driven  violently)   over  cragj:>- 
Steeps." 

107.  Timber  [1620-35?].  Sp.  I.  26,  46. 


92  The  Rise  of  Classical  Eyiglish  Criticism 

oin'  of  the  most  characteristic  traits  of  a  good  imaginative  writer. 
Says  Sidney  :'"^ 

"Let  but  Sophocles  bring  you  Ajax  on  a  stage,  killing  and 
whipping  sheep  and  oxen,  thinking  them  the  army  of  Greeks, 
Avith  their  chieftain  Agamemnon  and  Menelaus,  and  tell  me  if  you 
have  not  a  more  familiar  insight  into  anger  than  finding  in  the 
•Sfhoolmen  his  genus  and  difference."  lie  is,  however,  chary 
of  similes^"^  dra\Mi  from  herbarists  and  from  bestiaries. 

There  is  a  suggestion  that  Elizabethan  critics  are  a  little 
Aveary  of  over-figurative  language  and  wit :"°  "conceits  infamous 
and  vicious,  or  ridiculous  and  foolish,  or  of  no  good  example 
;iud  doctrine"  are.  according  to  Puttenham,"^  daily  seen. 

Jonson"-  commends — in  the  matter  of  figures — a  man  who 
never  "went  out  of  the  high  waA'  of  speaking,  but  for  some  great 
necessity  or  apparent  profit,"  and  adds  later  a  warning  against 
over-elaboration  of  language.  A  further  warning  quoted  from 
Quintilian.  against  mixed  metaphors,  follows.  Bolton/^^  re- 
ferring to  the  "rich  conceit  and  splendor  of  courtly  expressions" 
in  Philip  Sidney's  Arcadia,  warns  the  reader,  somewhat  mal 
apropos  that  such  ornaments  should  not  be  used  by  an  historian. 
"Q.  Elizabeth"  he  praises  for  a  combination  of  vitalit.y  with 
elegance.  The  queen  had  died  long  ])efore  this  was  published. 
Rej^nolds^^*  echoes  a  somewhat  conventional  distinction  between 
the  essence  of  poetry  and  the  accidents,  the  accidents  being 
figures  of  speech,  types  of  rhyme  and  similar  "adjuncts  of 
poesy. "^^^  Thomas  Sprat^'"  thinks  this  "trick  of  metaphors" 
easilv  obtained  and  vicious. 


lOS.  Apoloffi/    11583-95].    Sip.   I,    165. 

109.  lb.  202. 

110.  Cf.  Gosse,  Edmund,  From  Shalexperre  to  Pope:  An  Inquiry  into  Ihr 
Causes  and  Phenomena  of  the  Rixe  of  Classical  Poetry  in  Enffland.  Cambridge: 
1885,   p.    13. 

111.  /.  c.  [1589].  Sm.  II,  34.  For  a  complete  list  of  Puttenham's  108  figures 
of  speech,  see  Arber  Reprint,  Ch.  Ill,  p.   175,  rt  seq. 

112.  Timber  [1620-35].  Sp.  I,  24,  33,  40.  Cf.  also  Spingarn's  citation  from 
Rapin  [lb.  xlii]  to  the  effect  that  a  Christian  preacher  ought  to  avoid  what  is 
sparkling  in   exjjression  or  thought,   and  to  speak  clearly  and  unaffectedly. 

113.  IIi/i„rcritica    [1618?].   Sp.   I,    107. 

114.  Itythomystes   [1633?].   Sp.   I,    142. 

115.  Cf.  also  Alexander,   Anacrisis   [1634?].   Sp.   I,    182. 

116.  History  of  the  Royal  Society  [1667].  Sp.  II,  117.  Cf.  a  similar  reaction, 
not  against  figures.  Ijut  against  the  kindred  "wit"  in  the  Earl  of  Miilgrave's  poetical 
Essay  upon  Poetry.      [Sp.  II,  294.] 


Style  93 

Dryden  approves  of  figures,  "'riie  holdcst  strokes  ol"  poetry 
'most  delight.""'  lie  defends  liyperl)oIe  as  no  departure  from 
truth,  and  tlien  proceeds,  nearly  two  (u-nturies  ahead  of  time,  to 
give  a  fairly  accurate  statement  of  Kuskin's  theory  of  tlie 
pathetic  fallacy.  In  a  passion,  he  says,  a  man  is  not  cool  enough, 
either  to  reason  rightly,  or  to  talk  cahnly.  Aggravations  are  then 
in  their  proper  places;  interrogations,  exclamations,  or  a  dis- 
ordered connection  of  discourse,  are  graceful  there,  because 
they  are  natural.  The  sum  of  all  depends  on  what  before  1 
hinted,  that  this  boldness  of  expression  is  not  to  be  blamed,  if 
it  be  managed  by  the  coolness  and  discretion  which  is  neces.sary 
to  a  poet. ' ' 

At  the  same  time  figures  should  be  kept  within  bounds."* 

"As  in  a  room  contrived  for  state,  the  height  of  the  roof 
should  bear  a  proportion  to  the  area ;  so,  in  the  heightonings  of 
poetry,  the  strength  and  vehemence  of  the  figures  should  be 
suited  to  the  occasion,  the  subject,  and  the  persons." 

Again  he  finds"''  Ariosto's  style  "luxurious,  without  ma.iosty 
or  decency;"  and  Tasso  is  condemned  as — apart  from  other 
faults — "full  of  conceits,  points  of  epigram,  and  witticisms;  all 
which  are  not  only  below  the  dignity  of  heroic  verse,  but  con- 
trary to  its  nature."  He  approves  of  figures,  but  thinks  they 
should  be  concise.^-"  To  this  King  James  adds  the  useful  oKser- 
vation  that  comparisons  '-^  should  be  appropriate,  neither  higher 
nor  lower  than  the  subject. 

Another  observation  on  style,  rather  remarkable  for  this  age, 
is  Puttenham's  to  the  effect  that  language  ought  to  be  tunable 
to  the  ear."-.  The  chapter  heading  under  which  this  occurs 
states  that  the  rhetorical  points  therein  treated  are  for  all  good 
utterance  written  or  spoken.  Plainly  we  have  here  an  observa- 
tion on  prose  rhythm. 


117.  The    Author's    Aroloofl    for    Ileroic    Portry    and    Porlir    Lieentf.     [1677]. 
K.   I,    183,    185.    186. 

118.  Dedication   to  the  SpanUh  Friar   [1C81].  K.  I.   247.      Bohn.  J.   e..   114. 

119.  A     Dvicourse    Concerning    the    Oriijinal    and    Progre»»    of    Satire     [1693]. 
K.  II,  27. 

120.  Ih.    85. 

121.  /Short  Treatixe  on  Verse   [1584].  Sm.  I,  219. 

122.  I.  c.    [1589].   Sm.  II.   162. 


94  The  Rise  of  Classical  Eyiglish  Criticism 

^Most  of  the  discussion  upon  words^-''  in  the  England  of  the 
sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries  turns  upon  the  use  of  strange, 
obsolete  or  foreign  words. ^-*  The  matter  is  well  summed  up  by 
Wilson  in  his  Art  of  Rhetoric :^^^ 

"Among  all  other  lessons,  this  should  first  be  learned,  that 
we  never  affect  any  strange  ink-horn  terms,  but  to  speak  as  is 
commonly  received,  neither  seeking  to  be  over  fine,  nor  yet  being 
over  careless,  using  our  speech  as  most  men  do,  and  ordering  our 
Avits  as  the  fewest  have  done.  Some  seek  so  far  outlandish  Eng- 
lish, that  they  forget  altogether  their  mothers'  language.  And  I 
dare  swear  this,  if  some  of  their  mothers  were  alive,  they  were 
not  able  to  tell  what  they  say ;  and  yet  these  fine  English  clerks 
will  say  they  speak  in  their  mother  tongue — if  a  man  should 
charge  them  for  counterfeiting  the  king's  English.  *  *  *  * 
The  unlearned  or  foolish  phantastical  that  smells  but  of  learning 
(such  fellows  as  have  seen  learned  men  in  their  days)  will  so 
Latin  their  tongues  that  the  simple  cannot  but  wonder  at  their 
talk,  and  think  surely  they  speak  bj'  some  revelation.  I  know 
them  that  think  rhetoric  to  stand  wholly  upon  dark  words;  and 
he  that  can  catch  an  ink-horn  term  by  the  tail  him  they  count  to 
be  a  fine  Englishman  and  a  good  rhetorician." 

Other  warnings  of  the  same  nature  are  given  by  Gascoigne^^^ 
against  obsolete  and  strange  words  used  where  there  is  no  just 
occasion  for  them,  by  E.  K.,^^^  commenting  on  Spenser's 
Eclogues,  against  foreign  words,  by  Sidney^-*  against  over-orna- 
mentation in  words,  by  Puttenham^-'*  against  rustic  words  and 
the  affectations  of  scholars,  especially  words  borrowed  from 
foreign  tongues,  and  b.y  Samuel  DanieP^"  against  strange  and 
foreign  words.    Webbe,'''^  however,  like  a  good  pedant,  takes  the 


123.  On  this  .subject  cf.  Edward  E.  Hale,  junr.,  "Ideas  on  Rhetoric  in  the 
Sixteenth  Century."  Part  I:  Vocabulary.  Puh.  Mod.  Lang.  Assoc.  XVIII,  424. 
This  work  was  unfortunately  discontinued  by  Professor  Hale  on  the  completion  of 
his    Part    I. 

124.  See    Sm.    Ivii. 

125.  Collins,  Churton,  Essays  and  Literary  Fragments,  10.  Cited  also  by 
Hale,  /.  c. 

126.  The   Making   of  Verse    [157.5].    Sm.    I,    52. 

127.  Epistle  to  Harvey   [1579].  Sm.  I,   130. 

128.  Apology   [1583-95].   Sm.  I,  202. 

129.  I.  r.   [1589].  Sm.  II,   150,   151. 

130.  A   Defense  of  Rhyme   [1603?].   Sm.  II,   384. 

131.  I.  c.   [1586].  Sm.  I,  298. 


Style  95 

opposite  side,  and  says,  quotinf;  Ilorace  [via  Georgius  Fabrieius 
Cliemnicensis].^^^  "We  should  not  gape  after  the  phrases  of  the 
simpler  sort,"  but  write  for  learned  men."  In  the  matter  of 
rustic  diction  we  have  a  pretty  contradiction,  E.  K.,  the  com- 
mentator on  Spenser's  pastorals,  praising  the  obsolete  words  of 
that  poet  as  most  fit  for  rustic  shepherds,"^  and  Sidney''*  re- 
fusing to  credit  the  poet  with  reasonableness  in  his  "old  rustic 
language"  since  Theocritus,  Virgil  and  Sanazar  did  not  affect 
such  language. 

On  this  matter  of  using  strange  words  Ben  Jonson's  dicta 
and  Dryden's  may  be  noted  separately,  since  those  critics  had 
the  most  complete  and  careful  theories,  and  were,  moreover,  by 
reason  of  their  character  as  playwrights  better  qualified  than 
most  to  speak  upon  the  subject.  The  "true  artificer,"  accord- 
ing to  Jonson^^^  avoids  phrases  that  are  "faint,  obscure,  obscene, 
sordid,  humble,  improper,  or  effeminate,"  also  obsolete  words; 
he  is  also  chary  of  coining  new  words.  In  his  Poctaster^^'^  he 
says: 

"You  must  not  hunt  for  wild  outlandish  terms, 
To  stuff  out  a  peculiar  dialect; 
But  let  your  matter  run  before  your  words. 
And  if,  at  any  time,  you  chance  to  meet 
Some  Gallo-Belgic  phrase,  you  shall  not  straight 
Rack  your  poor  verse  to  give  it  entertainment, 
But  let  it  pass:  and  do  not  think  yourself 
Much  damnified,  if  you  do  leave  it  out, 
When  nor  your  understanding  nor  the  sense 
Could  well  receive  it.    This  fair  abstinence. 
In  time,  will  render  you  more  sound  and  clear." 
Dryden^^^  advocated  the  rejection  of  old  words  or  phrases  that 
are  ill  sounding  or  improper  and  the  admission  of  new  words 
that  are  better  in  these  respects  or  that  are  more  significant;  but 
with  the  qualification  that  the  writer  must  go  slowly  and  wait 


132.  De  Re   Poetica  Libri  Septem.    [1560] 

l."!3.  Epistle  to  Harvey   [1579].   Sm.  I.   128. 

134.  Apology   [158395].   Sm.   I,    196. 

135.  Timber   [1620-35?]-  Sp.   I,  23,   38. 

136.  V.  Ill   [1601].  Sm.  II,   397. 

137.  Defence  of  the  Epilogue   [1672].  K.  I,   164.   170. 


96  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticism 

until  oustom  has  familiarized  new  words.' '°  ITe  also  approves  of 
llio  borrowing  of  forei«rn  words,^-'*'  since  the  English  vocabulary 
is  not  resplendent  enough  for  the  English  poet,  but  the  borrow- 
ing must  be  cautious  and  sparing,  and  the  borrowed  words  must 
be  beautiful  in  Latin  and  in  agreement  with  the  English  idiom;"" 
tiiey  should  also  meet  the  approval  of  friends  of  the  poet  who 
know  both  languages. 

A  defense  of  onomatopfeia  is  also  to  be  found  in  criticism  at 
this  time,  in  the  opinions  of  Carew'^'  and  Dryden"-.  Carew 
tinds  the  various  interjections  expressive  for  the  corresponding 
emotions.  In  general  langtiage  also  English  is  suggestive.  The 
liiing  tliat  seems  to  have  caught  Carew 's  attention  here  is  com- 
pound terms,  such  as  moldwarp  which  expresses  the  nature  of 
the  beast,  handkcrclier,  which  shows  the  thing  and  its  use,  and 
similar  words.' ^^  Dryden  also  praises  such  qualities,  in  quoting 
Ovid's  praise  of  Virgil. 

The  consideration  of  words  versus  matter  was  also  a  common 
one.  Samuel  Daniel' ^^  reminds  us  that  "Eloquence  and  gay 
words  are  not  of  tlie  substance  of  wit."  Davenant  observes  that 
very  innnature  youtlis'^"'  conceive  wit  to  consist  in  the  music  of 
words;  while  Dryden,""  referring  to  word  use  in  wit,  gravely 
observes  that  "Wit  is  best  conveyed  to  us  in  the  most  easy  lan- 
guage." 

Words  without  matter  are  objectionable  in  learning.  Bacon^*'^ 
speaks  somewhat  suspiciously  of  the  delusive  powers  of  words, 
as  a  modern  business  man  might  speak  of  "mere  words,"  and 
protests  against  the  "distemper  of  learning"  in  which  "men 
study  words  and  not  matter "'^'^  Ben  Jonson  is  distinctly  scornful 


I'.iH.  This   clause   sounds   contradictory,   but   the   import   is   not    clear. 

1.^9.  Dedication   of  the  .^nevi   [1697].   K.   II,   234. 

140.  Would  that  the  modern  scientists  who  are  creating  the  "New  Latin" 
language  could   be  induced   to  borrow  Dryden's  doctrine  on  this  point! 

141.  The  ExrMeriey  of  EvriHsh    [1.59.5-6?]    Sm.   II.   287. 

142.  Preface   to  Annus   Miralnlin    |16G7].    K    1,    17. 

143.  His  idea  here  seems  to  be  like  that  of  those  Germans  who  praise  their 
language  for  its  resourcefulness  in  creating  naiive  and  therefore  suggestive  com- 
j>ounds. 

144.  A    Difrnne  of  lihi/m,-   [1603?].   Sm.   II,   372. 

145.  Preface  to  Oondihi-rt    [1650].   Sp.   II,   21. 

146.  Kxyni/  of  Drmn.  P.    [1668],    Eugenius  si)eaking.     K.   I,   52. 

147.  Adrarircm'nt    of   Liarnim/.   XIV,    11,    11605].    Saintsbury    II,    194. 

148.  lb.   I,   Sp.   I,   3 


StyU  97 

over  such  vice,'*"  and  jeers  especially  at  the  empty  hut  riowery 
phraseoJoPTy  in  which  letters  seem  oftiTi  to  have  l)een  couclicd. 
Such,  says  Jonson,  "f^o  a  he^^_Mn<^  for  some  meaning,  and  lahor 
to  he  delivered  of  the  great  hurthen  of  nothing."  Words,  he 
adds,  must,  for  the  speech  of  a  fictitious  character,  correspond 
to  the  speaker.''*" 

A  warning  is  added  hy  Ilohhes'^'  a^'ainst  technical  words. 
We  also  have  a  warning  against  falling  into  commonplace  repeti- 
tion. King  James^^-  devotes  the  whole  of  a  short  chapter  to  the 
matter.  Finally  we  maj'  end  our  chapter — somewhat  ignomini- 
ously — on  puns.  Dr^'den""*  condemns  puns,  hut  approves  of 
"turns"  on  words.  Writing  of  this  last,  he  speaks  interastingly 
of  the  manner  in  which  he  discovered  the  existence  and  character 
of  "turns."  He  was  advised  to  imitate  those  of  Waller  and 
Denham,  and  discovered  that  he  had  a  few  such  turns  in  his 
own  plays.  He  then  turned  to  Cowley,  the  "darling"  of  his 
youth,  but  found  only  "points  of  wit,"  and  "quirks  of  epigram," 
puerilities,  he  calls  them,  both.  Then  he  went  to  Milton,  but  in 
vain ;  at  last  his  search  was  rewarded.  In  the  Faerie  Queene  he 
found  his  turns  first,  then  in  Tasso's  verse;  moreover  he  found 
that  all  Italian  sonnets  "are  on  the  turn  of  the  first  thought." 
In  Latin,  Virgil  and  Ovid  are  the  "principal  fountains"  of 
turns.  As  he  nowhere  defines  turns,  we  must  be  content  to  ob- 
serve their  nature  in  the  examples  he  gives.  It  will  be  sufficient 
to  record  one  of  his  four  examples : 

Heu !  quantum  scelus  est,  in  viscera,  viscera  condi ! 

Congestoque  avidum  pinguescere  corpore  corpus; 

Alteriusque  animantem  ani mantis  vivere  leto. 


149.  Timber   [1620  35?].  Saintsbury   II,  207.      Sp.   I,  45. 

150.  lb.  Sp.  I,  37. 

151.  The    Virtuen  of  an  Heroic  Poem    [1675].   Sp.   II.   68. 

152.  A  Short  TreatUe  on  Verse.     Ch.  VI   [1584].  Sm.  I.  220. 

15.3.  A  DUrourxe  Concerning  the  Original  and  Progreim  of  Satirr  fl69.*?]. 
K.  II,  95.  108  109.  Cf.  also  Gerard  Langbaine,  Egsay  on  Dryden  [1691).  Sp. 
HI,    125. 


CHAPTER  VI:    VERSE  TECHNIQUE 


lu  discussing  the  verse-technique^  of  the  sixteenth  and  seven- 
teenth century  English  critics,  prosod^^  as  such  will  he  passed  by ; 
first  because  it  comprises  a  part  of  a  distinct  and  separate  field 
of  stud}',  a  field  as  distinct  from  that  of  criticism — as  avc  define 
it — as  a  modern  book  on  i)rosody  is  from  a  modern  book  on  the 
philosophy  of  rhetoric ;  and  second,  because  so  much  of  the 
prosody,  even  if  it  could  lie  regarded  as  a  part  of  our  subject, 
would  be  but  a  dead  part,  the  theories  expressed  being  in  consid- 
r'rable  number  wholly  exploded  theories ;  such,  for  example,  as 
that  concerning  the  use  of  Latin  meters  in  English,  or  the  for- 
bidding of  tlie  license  of  sjdlabic  equivalence  [trisj'llabic  sulisti- 
tutious  in  iambic  feet],  or  the  use  of  feminine  rliymes. 

Concerning  verse  technique,  apart  from  this,  there  is  but 
little  said,  but  the  little  is  of  importance.  At  the  threshold  of 
the  subject  stands  King  James's  warning-  that  language  should 
not  be  forced  or  padded  to  fill  out  lines.  As  important  is  the 
other  warning  that  words  should  not  be  forced  for  rhymes.^  Put- 
tenham*  has  a  chapter  headed  How  the  Good  Maker  Will  not 
'Wrench  his  ^Vor(l  to  Help  his  Bhyme,  Either  hy  Falsifying  his 
Accent,  or  hy  Untrue  Orthography....  Daniel,  in  his  Defense  of 
Ehyme''  admits  that  the  ancients  did  torture  language  to  make 
odes;  but  he  defends  rhj-me — even  the  rhymes  of  the  sonnet — 
and  also  the  fixed  length— as  a  disciplinary  regulating  device. 
In  fact,  he  adds,  a  poet  will  write  the  better  in  rhyme  because 


1.  Cf.  on  this  subject  Srhclling,  Felix  E.,  Poetic  anil  Ytrie  Crilicixm  in  the 
Reign  of  Elizabeth.  [Pub.  of  the  Univ.  of  Pa.]  1891.  Some  or  Professor  Schelling'.s 
■work  is  du))lic:ited  here,  from  independent  evidence,  however.  The  bulk  of  his  work 
deals  though   with  prosody,  the  other  portions  l)eing  for  the  most   jiart  sketcliy. 

2.  A  Short  Treatise  on  Verse   [1584].   Sm.  I,   217. 

3.  Webbe's  treatment  of  rhyme  has  such  a  beautiful  simplicity  that  it  is  a 
pity  to  pass  it  by  [158G.  Sm.  I,  275].  After  writing  the  first  line,  the  poet  should 
take  up  all  possil)le  rh^minK  words  [alphabetically  for  convenience]  :  "For  example, 
if  your  last  word  end  in  book,  you  may  straightways  in  your  mind  run  them  over 
thus,  brook,  cook,  crook,  hook,  look,  nook,  pook,  rook,  forsook,  took,  awook,  etc.  Now 
it  is  twenty  to  one.  but  always  one  of  these  shall  ,iump  with  your  former  word  and 
matter  in  good   sense.      If  not,   then  alter  the  first." 

4.  /.  c.    [1589].   Sm.  II,   84. 

5.  [1603?].   Sm.   II,    365. 

-98- 


Verse  Technique  99 

he  has  to  work  liardcr  to  do  it.  lie  admits,  thouf^h,  somewhat 
relucfantly,  that  a  tra^'edy  liad  best  dis[)ens('  with  rhynic,  cxec-pt 
in  the  ehorus."  Drummoud,'  aeeordin^'  to  Ben  Jonson,  objects  to 
stanzas  and  eross  rhymes  in  that  they  are  likely  to  force  the 
words;  he  finds  couplets  superior.  Jonson  also  quotes  Druin- 
mond's  objection  to  the  sonnet  as  a  sort  of  Procrustes  bed,  which 

cuts  thought  to  fixed  lengths.* 

Milton's  objection  to  rliyme,  as  expressed  in  his  Preface  to 
Paradise  Lost  is  well  known : 

"Rhyme  being  no  necessary  adjunct  or  true  ornament  of 
poem  or  good  verse,  in  longer  works  especially,  but  the  invention 
of  a  barbarous  age,  to  set  off  wretched  matter  and  lame  meter; 
graced  indeed  since  by  the  use  of  some  famous  modern  poets, 
carried  away  by  custom,  but  much  to  their  own  vexation,  hin- 
drance and  constraint  to  express  many  things  otherwise,  and  for 
the  most  part  worse,  than  else  they  would  have  expressed  them." 

Sir  Robert  Howard^  objects  to  rhyme  in  a  play,  because  it 
suggests  design  and  not  spontaneity,  and  waves  aside  the  argu- 
ment that  rhyme  checks  the  flow  of  fancy  and  so  allows  judg- 
ment to  enter.  Dryden,  however,  defends  rhyme.  He  disap- 
proves of  forced  rhyme,^°  and  advocates  the  ten  foot  line,  in 
which  the  rhymed  words  are  far  enough  apart  to  give  the  poet 
room  to  turn  around.  In  the  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesy,  how- 
ever, when  Crites  [Sir  Robert  Howard]  objects  to  rhj'me,  Nean- 
der  [Dryden]  entirely  overthrows  all  the  objections,"  so  far  as 
heroic  plays  are  concerned,  though  he  excludes  comedy  from  his 
defense.  Dryden 's  reasons  for  defending  rhyme  have  already 
been  touched  upon.^-  They  are  so  involved  and  inconsistent 
that  it  seems  scarcely  worth  while  to  repeat  them  here  in  full. 
They  may,  however,  be  considered  as  summed  up,  so  far  as  their 


6.  lb.  382. 

7.  [1619].  Saintsbury  II,   199. 

8.  Cf.    Danids    defense   of   the   fi.xed    sonnet   length    [/.    c.    366],    which    keeps 
the  sonnet  passion  within   bounds. 

9.  Preface  to  Four  New  Plays   [1665].  Sp.   II,   102. 

10.  Pref.  to  /t;ini/*  Mirnbiliji    [1667].   K.    I,    12,   and  Esuay  of  Dram.   P.    IU>(>mJ. 
all  speakers  to  this  controversy  for  once  apreeinp.  K.  1,  35. 

11.  Essay   of   Dram.   P.    [1668].    K.    I.    91.    94. 

12.  See  p.   17.     Note. 


1 00  The  Rise  of  Classical  English  Criticistn 

4'ssi'nce  is  concerned,  in  the  following  passage  from  his  Epistle 
Ih (licator}!  to  the  Rival  Ladies:^'^ 

"The  advantages  which  rhyme  has  over  blank  verse  are  so 
many,  that  it  were  last  time  to  name  them.  Sir  Philip  Sidney" 
in  his  Defense  of  Poesy,  gives  us  one,  which,  in  my  opinion,  is 
not  the  least  considerable;  I  mean  the  help  it  brings  to  memory,^'* 
wliich  rhyme  so  knits  up,  hy  the  affinity  of  sounds,  that,  by  re- 
membering the  last  word  in  one  line,  we  often  call  to  mind  both 
the  verses.  Then,  in  the  quickness  of  repartees  (which  in  discur- 
sive scenes  fall  very  often),  it  has  so  particular  a  grace,  and  is  so 
aptly  suited  to  them,  that  the  sudden  smartness  of  the  answer, 
and  the  sweetness  of  the  rhyme,  set  off  the  beauty  of  each  other. 
Hut  that  benefit  which  I  consider  most  in  it,  because  I  have  not 
seldom  found  it,  is,  that  it  bounds  and  circumscribes  the  fancy. 
For  imagination  in  a  poet  is  a  faculty  so  wild  and  lawless,  that 
like  an  high-ranging  spaniel,  it  must  have  clogs  tied  to  it,  lest 
it  outrun  judgment.  The  great  easiness  of  blank  verse  renders 
the  poet  too  luxuriant ;  he  is  tempted  to  say  many  things,  which 
might  better  be  omitted,  or  at  least  shut  up  in  fewer  words ;  but 
when  the  difficult\'  of  artful  rhyming  is  interposed,  where  the 
poet  commonly  confines  his  sense  to  his  couplet,  and  must  con- 
trive that  sense  into  such  words  that  the  rhyme  shall  naturally 
follow  them,  not  they  the  rhyme;  the  fancy  then  gives  leisure 
to  the  judgment  to  come  in.  which,  seeing  so  heavy  a  tax  imposed, 
is  ready  to  cut  off  all  unnecessary  expenses." 

Plainly  this  is  a  classical  doctrine,  though  much  blurred  by  a 
d&sperate  attempt  to  reconcile  the  classicist's  realism  with  the 
classicist's  idealism,  a  Danaidean  task  that  no  man  has  yet  per- 
formed. 

Concerning  the  couplet  we  have  two  opposite  opinions  from 
p]lizabethan  critics,  that  of  Gascoigne,^"  who  accepts  the  couplet 
and  adds  an  adhortation  to  use  the  endstopped  line — both  in  the 
couplet  and  elsewhere, — and  that  of  Daniel,^^  who  finds  a  long 


13.  [1604].    K.    I,    7.      It    should    be    noted    that    towards   the   end   of    his    career, 
Dryden   abandoned  rhyme  in   his  own   plays. 

14.  Cf.   Ch.   II. 

15.  Cf.    also    Sir    .John    llarinpton,    A     ISriif    Apolomi    for    Puilrii     [1501].    Sm. 
II.   20fi. 

16.  [1.37.',].    Wylie,    9. 

17.  I)ff--nxf    of    Rhilmr    [1C03?].    Sm.    II,    38.3. 


I'frsc  Technique  101 

series  of  couplets  tiresome — l»ut  adds  that  i)t'rliai)s  that  is  due  to 
personal  taste  merely.  Ben  Jonson's"*  prt-t'cntHi-  for  <-ouf)let8 
over  other  rhymes  has  been  notieed. 

On  musieal  rhythm  as  conveyed  by  individual  words,  there 
are  some  opinions  at  this  time,  daseoif^nc'-'  finds  that  words  of 
many  syllables  eloy  a  verse.  Alliteration  is  approved  by  Kinj^ 
James;-"  not  alliteration  merely  in  the  first  letters  of  words,  but 
a  runninf?  of  a  verse  upon  certain  letters.  Sir  John  llarinf^ton 
points  out  another  use  rather  than  virtue  of  vers<',  its  forcible 
manner  of  phrase,"  in  which,  if  it  be  well  made,  it  excelh^th 
loose  speech  or  prose." 


18.  [1619].  Saintsbury  II,   199. 

19.  The  Making  of  Verse   [1575].   Sm.  I,   51.      For  a  possible  partial  explanation 
of  Gascoignes  statement,  see  King  James's  Short  Treatise  on  Verse  .   Sm.   I,  212  213. 

20.  A    Short    Treatise   on    Verse    [1584].    Sm.    I,    218.      Cf.    Sidney    Lanier's    fa 
mous  theory  of  verse-tones. 


'J. 


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DATE  DUE 

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GAYLORD 

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iCaiTY 


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